


The Soldier and the Swan

by This_Immortal_Hope



Category: A Court of Thorns and Roses Series - Sarah J. Maas
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-19
Updated: 2020-05-05
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:39:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 23,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23729926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/This_Immortal_Hope/pseuds/This_Immortal_Hope
Summary: Nesta Archeron has worked her entire life to become a principal ballerina with the New York Ballet, and she does NOT appreciate the large, brutish man behind the camera lens at her promo photoshoot, or the fact that he is casually barging into her dressing room, or the continued mentions of his mysterious "personal project".Or:The stage lights are bright and the audience lights are entirely down, so she can’t see his face, but in that moment Nesta swears she can feel the mystery photographer’s mouth quirk up into a slight grin “alright, my bad, Sugar Plum Fairy”“This is Swan Lake!” Her voice rises in indignation, because really… they couldn’t even get a photographer who knew what the damn ballet was. Nesta Archeron has put 23 years of her life into fighting and bleeding and clawing her way to this pinnacle roll and she can practically feel ice fill her veins at the realization that the billboards around the city and fliers in the mail were going to feature a photo of her shot by some imbecile jock who thought she was doing the Nutcracker! It’s July for gods sake.
Relationships: Feyre Archeron/Rhysand, Nesta Archeron & Cassian, Nesta Archeron/Cassian
Comments: 39
Kudos: 160





	1. Part i: The Flash

Part I: The Flash

Nesta can feel the first knuckle on her big toe quivering, it has been for the last few moments of holding this seemingly never-ending arabesque. Her left leg is hovering in midair, elongated out straight as an arrow behind her, toes pointed hard inside of her pointe shoe to show off the lean, toned muscles of her calf even through the light pink tights. She hears the camera click again and arches her back to lift that leg higher, higher, higher.

Her right leg is about to give out. She can feel it and she continues to fight it, the plastered-on stage smile giving way to her usual steely gaze of perfect concentration. Nesta shifts just a little, careful to keep her weight wholly on her own foot and not risk leaning into Tamlin too much, lest her hand appear to be gripping rather than resting on his. Her co-star seems to sense this and strengthens the grip of the hand he holds on her waist just a little, trying to help. She can do this. The camera snaps again. Once, twice, she loses track of how many times that gentle _click_ sounds from somewhere in the middle of the empty rows of theatre seats.

For a brief moment Nesta envies the sweet-faced company of girls behind her who have to do nothing but lean on one knee with their arms folded delicately into third position, but no… she has been those girls, and she knows that this is better. She has worked her entire life, pushed her body to the absolute limits, eat slept and breathed ballet since the moment she could walk, all for this. This moment.

Her brows crease a little as she fights the pain and then the camera flashes so brightly that she loses her spot on the wall, balance teetering and toes giving out beneath her. Tamlin’s gripped hand on her waist is the only thing that stops her from completely falling over and for the first time since looking at that cast E mail, she is grateful that he is playing the Prince. Dancing with her sister’s controlling ex-boyfriend might have its downsides, but at least he wouldn’t let her fall flat on her face.

Nesta swears under her breath at the loss of balance and then rights herself. She knows that if she was the sweet, demure company lead that the prestigious New York Ballet Company expects her to be then she would blush prettily and murmur a polite apology to the photographer before retaking her position. Instead she faces forward, puts her hands right above the straight skirt of her sky blue TuTu and fixes an icy glare in the general direction of the shuttering camera “I told you to warn me when you were turning the flash on. You made me lose my spot!”

“Your what?” The voice is deep and teasing, undeniably male and Nesta just rolls her eyes. Clearly he doesn’t know the first thing about ballet. Probably some washed up sports photographer who took this job in the off-season.

“my _Spot_ ” she spits the word at him “a non-moving place on the wall where a dancer looks to keep her balance” she recites the words like she is reading from a dictionary “like for example, when she is doing turns or I don’t know, balancing her entire body weight on the first 2 knuckles of her right foot for hours on end and needs uninterrupted _concentration_ ”

The stage lights are bright and the audience lights are entirely down, so she can’t see his face, but in that moment Nesta swears she can feel the mystery photographer’s mouth quirk up into a slight grin “alright, my bad, sorry Sugar Plum Fairy.”

“This is _Swan Lake_! _”_ Her voice rises in indignation, because really… they couldn’t even get a photographer who knew what the damn ballet was. Nesta Archeron has put 23 years of her life into fighting and bleeding and clawing her way to this pinnacle roll and she can practically feel ice fill her veins at the realization that the billboards around the city and fliers in the mail were going to feature a photo of her shot by some imbecile jock who thought she was doing the Nutcracker! It’s July for gods sake.

“Is that not the one with the sugar plum fairy?” He asks lazily and she hears his camera still clicking away.

“No you absolute idiot, it is not” she can feel the company girls shaking a little behind her, unsure if they are allowed to rest their tired, upheld arms. No one gets in Nesta’s way when she is like this. Except, it would seem, for this photographer with the drawling voice and the clear death wish.

Cassian just smiles to himself as he takes in the breathtaking woman on stage, his camera never stops clicking. That grey in her eyes, he has to capture it. The tightening of her hands inside the soft tulle of her tutu offers the most delicious juxtaposition. He just knows that those seconds before he purposefully flashed the beam light, where her pose was perfect, but her face dropped into a steely mask of concentration, are going to be incredible. The company won’t use them, of course, but that has always been his deal with the New York Ballet. He spends hours shooting the pretty, perfect, smiling photos they want, and they pay him buckets to print the cookie-cutter images on all their programs and promotional materials. Meanwhile, he catches these perfect ballerinas in their moments of struggle and anguish, shows their bleeding broken feet so at odds with their pretty pink costumes and demure dispositions.

Not this girl, however. He grin widens more and more the angrier she gets, he turns his lens in on the furrow between her brows and fire in her blue-grey eyes. He lines his camera up perfectly, narrowing in on her profiled face as she turns to the dancers behind her. He waits for the perfect moment and then he smiles “are you going to get back into position any time soon or are we to be here all night?” _Click_. He catches the exact moment that her head whips to him, her glare poised to shatter his camera lens. The set of her jaw and pure, unadulterated rage in her eyes may have been enough to castrate a lesser man, but not Cassian. Cassian is more intrigued than ever by this perfect ballerina ice queen.

She just growls, flipping him a crude gesture that seems so out of character for any ballerina he has ever photographed before. Cassian curses himself for still being focused in on her face and missing that shot. He knows he will forgive himself when he blows up that image of her eyes though, knows it was worth missing the other shot.

 _Knives_ , he thought, there were knives in her stare as she took a calming breath and hitched herself back into that same impossible position.

Cassian catches the ripple of her upper thigh muscles just as she stretches them to perfect tension and almost feels himself groan as he devours her with the lens of his camera. Every inch of her is textbook, photographic perfection. When he first saw her, he thought her face and lean, muscled body was simply too perfect, that he would not get anything interesting out of her. But as she plasters that fake stage smile on again, he grins, zeroing in on where the fire still blazes in her overly lined eyes.

Cassian takes his time moving down every inch of her body, capturing each perfect segment from the gentle, inviting protrusion of her breasts inside that wickedly tight corseted top to the careful curve of her back into the most perfect dip he’s ever seen. He doesn’t even mind the slightly gripped male hand at her waist. He has been carefully cutting the man out of his study of her body, but for this shot he lets the hand stay and scolds himself internally for wishing it was his own. Her neck is slender and long, and he feels himself aching to press his lips to the hollow where it meets her collarbone.

Cassian takes gentle, carefully studied shots until he makes it to her feet and gasps a little. He is a touch ashamed to say that he does shutter his lens a few times before calling out “you’re bleeding”, guilt riddling his tone for making her hold the position so long.

He catches the shock in her eyes as they glance down and she sighs a little “blister from last week” she explains in a frustrated tone, speaking more to herself than him “I thought it had calloused over. Apparently not” she shakes her head and groans a little internally at the thought of breaking in yet another pair of pointe shoes. Of course, she’s used to it and has boxes of extras in her dressing room, but now is not the best time.

“Can you photoshop it or do I need to go get a new pair?” He isn’t sure how she manages to level her gaze with his so exactly considering she must not be able to see him at all. He also shakes his head a little at the notion that the only problem with her feet bleeding so heavily that it has soaked through the thick block and delicate satin of her slipper is the aesthetics of it.

“It will take me a while to break in a pair new enough to be photo-ready and it would probably save everyone a lot of time if we could just photoshop out the blood” she shrugs.

Cassian eyes her carefully, watching the steel rod straightness of her spine, the steady determination written on her face. A soldier, he thinks to himself. That’s what she is, a soldier wrapped in soft tulle. Annoyed at her weapon for running out of bullets, not wanting to waste the time it will take to break into the feel of a new one. She has her men to worry about, after all. The ones who kneel behind her in gossamer skirts of perfect white. Cassian snaps his camera just as she turns to look at them. A general and her army.

“I don’t use photoshop” he finally says, the words falling lazily from his mouth as he watches the contempt in her eyes for only a moment, and then she sighs and he sees something else there, acceptance… no, respect. A glimmer of respect for him, for not taking shortcuts. The dancer begins to leave the stage, but he finds himself with an even better idea.

“Wait” he calls after her “we can send the background girls home, pick a different costume from the show and I’ll do some action shots while you break in the shoes. Then we can call in that Lucifer guy someone said they wanted shots of”

“Lucien” she corrects him with a wary glance

“Yeah yeah the one playing the wizard dude”

Nesta take a deep breath, as if summoning the power of the mother to give her strength to deal with his idiocy. The moment passes and her spine shoots straight again as she pushes back the single strand of hair that has dared to escaped her perfectly braided bun “ok, do you want the curse Pas De Deux or the black swan?”

“Isn’t the black swan a different dancer?” He asks and she sighs again.

“I don’t have time to explain this entire ballet to you, photo boy, if we want to be out of here before midnight, so I’ll make it simple. Curse scene- I’m in the classic white swan costume, Lucien is in black. Just the two of us, and the swans, but we can do the actions shots without them easily. Ball scene, I’m in the black swan costume, Lucien is also in Black and we would need to change the company girls and keep Tamlin for that one to make any sense” the stare she gives him can only be described as withering.

“Send everyone else home” he says with a wave of his hand, determined to shoot her by herself. “Wizard guy isn’t called until 4 so that gives lots of time for you to change, break in your shoes, do some solo shots and then finish off with him” his tone is commanding, all business and Nesta just nods.

“Finally, a decision” she scoffs “alert the media”

“not until the photos are ready, sweetheart” he calls out after her, laughing as her footsteps grow heavier in irritation.

Cassian turns to the remaining dancers and smiles “thank you for your work today everyone, class dismissed!” The stage slowly starts to clear as various dancers stretch and crack their sore muscles. Once he knows that he is alone Cassian grins, looking to the display screen on his camera with hungry eyes. He is about 4 images back, reviling in the grisly beauty of that blood-soaked slipper when he realizes that he is missing a golden opportunity.


	2. Part ii: The Dressing Room

**Part II: The Dressing Room**

Nesta shoves the skirt of her tutu off the second she enters her dressing room, unhooking the back of it immediately and breathing a sigh of relief to be left in her simple slate grey body suit. One of her favourites, she always wears it under costumes for luck.

She stretches her right leg out behind her, trying to ensure that the muscles don’t seize from her position earlier, not daring to take the shoes off until she’s massaged some blood back into her calf. She sits on the floor and stretches the leg out in front of her, bending her whole body over it and rubbing slow, smooth circles along the tired muscles before reaching down to the tightly tied ribbon at her ankle.

The second Nesta gives the single pull that unravels the entire ribbon she hears the soft _click_ of a camera and whips her head to the door in anger. “Excuse you” she shoots at the man whose entire face is covered by that giant camera lens and thick, wavy strands of dark hair that have escaped his loose bun. “this is my dressing room! As in, I could have been naked, and you could be finding yourself on the other side of an involuntary pornography lawsuit!”

The photographer bursts out laughing at her threat, lowering the camera for the first time so she can take in his tan skin, crooked grin, and those Hazel eyes that are looking at every inch of her body, not in lust though, she knows the lust look. Knows what it is to have a man stare at you in a way that means he only wants one thing. No, his eyes are studying her, nothing more than a green-gold extension of his camera lens

“Perhaps if you are worried about your modesty you should not leave the door wide open”

“Perhaps if you were better at your job I wouldn’t have to be rubbing a knot the size of a boulder out of my right calf” she snaps back.

“Oh, I got the shot for the promo stuff hours ago”

He clicks that infernal camera again as her jaw tightens and she stares him down “then why-“

“personal project” he shrugs “I wouldn’t take these shots if the academy didn’t let me play around a bit”

“Let me guess” she levels him with a gaze like stone “you usually shoot ‘real sports’ with big men in stupid shorts fighting over where to shove their balls”

Cassian laughs at that, finally leaning down to join her on the floor “I usually shoot war zones” and gods did it feel like he was in one right now. Blood and everything.

The statement intrigues Nesta enough that the steel in her gaze shifts to mere iron and she doesn’t even object when his large hand moves to take off her pointe shoe. _Click_. She narrows her eyes a little more as he loops his calloused finger into the cut out at the bottom of her tights and starts to roll the blood-soaked material up her leg, stopping at her knee. _Click_. His thumb presses into the exact spot that has been so tight and the muscles in his arms flex as he applies more pressure than her thin ballerina arms could manage. Nesta hears herself groan a little and looks absolutely appalled as the man with the camera smirks.

“How did you-”

“I saw it quivering through the lens” he admits gently, sliding a second hand up her leg, easily cutting through her knotted muscles like butter.

Cassian clenches his jaw tightly to stop himself from letting out a noise of his own as his hands meet her impossibly soft skin. Every muscle his hands glide across is lean, softly defined, and tight. He sets about loosening them up like it’s his job and the steely spitfire says nothing as he moves to her other leg. He doesn’t dare move more than a few inches above the knee, sensing how delicate the balance is, that at any moment she could jump backwards, and he’d lose the moment and the opportunity to shoot her. He catches her rolling her shoulder and carefully moves himself to sit behind her “May I?” He asks gently

Nesta doesn’t know what it is inside of her that is allowing this man to paw at her, but after days and days of 14-hour rehearsals it feels so good to have strong hands working through her tightly knotted muscles. She tells herself that is the only reason that she shifts back just a little, fitting herself between this photographer’s legs, spread in a lazy version of her favourite stretch and nods her head silently.

“Tell me about the black swan” he says as she fights not to let out another moan when his careful, strong fingers hold the pressure right at the spot between her shoulder blade and spine that had been giving her hell for days. The pressure point hurts and she knows he is trying to distract her, but she starts talking anyway.

“The black swan is a trick, a mirage. The magician, Rothbart, he casts a spell on his own daughter, Odile, to trick the prince into thinking that she is Odette, the swan Queen that he has cursed” she doesn’t know why she is telling him this, the words just spill out of her in a carefully rehearsed monologue that is practically second nature, the story having been committed to memory long ago in a theatre just like this one as she sat in the audience with tiny, wide eyes.

“Why?” The photographer’s voice is so quiet, not teasing as it was before and his hands, which have moved to her left bicep, gently easing the hour of third position arabesque feel so good that she doesn’t even think before responding.

“so that the Prince will declare his never-ending love for Odile instead of Odette and then her curse will never be broken, she’ll stay a swan forever.” The words slip out of her mouth as easily as her body slips into first position at the beginning of a rehearsal.

Cassian listens to her silently. Her voice is soft, reverent even, as she describes the plot of the ballet whose program will bare his name in the bottom left corner. The way she speaks about the story makes him almost wish he’d wikipedia’d the thing before coming down here. “And you have to play both parts?”

“I don’t _have_ to, I _get_ to” her voice is harder now “this is the one thing I remember wanting ever since I can remember anything” she shakes her head a little, unsure why she is telling him all of this as she leans back into his ministrations now on her right arm “the white and black swans aren’t always played by the same dancer, it is… very challenging to do both, the changing alone makes it almost not worth the attempt, but…”

“you don’t strike me as someone who does anything halfway” he admits, not quite sure why he does.

Nesta smiles the tiniest bit and turns to face him, their bodies so close she could kiss him if she just leaned forward a little “I have torn the skin off of my feet so that it could grow back calloused and strong enough to hold my weight. I have turned on point shoes with cracking souls until my feet truly bled. Not this tiny leak you see now, but bled so heavily that I had to stop turning or I would slip in the puddle. I have popped and cracked and snapped every joint in my body to make it stretch further, hold longer, move softer. I have trained my body to move with the music the same way a swimmer trains their body to slice through water.” She pauses, gaze suddenly cold again as she stares up at him “I have torn my body apart and put it back together again so that I could play these roles on this stage. And I will _NOT_ let some arrogant photographer snicker as he flashes lights in my eyes to knock me off balance and laugh about the frivolity of ballet as a necessary paycheque”

“I never said-“

“You didn’t have to” she grits her teeth, unfairly projecting every man who ever told her dance wasn’t a “real sport” onto this photographer with his teasing grin and strong hands, strength that comes from grunting annoyingly at the gym as he chucks heavy things around and interrupts the Tchaikovsky playing in her headphones as she runs on the treadmill in the winter months. “Get out, I have to change”

_Click_. He captures the exact second that she closes herself off again. He won’t show that to anyone, but he is intrigued by it, wishes he could dive inside her head. See who hurt her to make her snap shut so quickly.

Nesta stands tall, lifting her arms over her head in a long stretch as she arches her back and shakes her legs out a little. She tries not to think about how good her newly loosened muscles feel as she watches his bun bounce a little while leaves the room.

She scoffs, even his hair is lazy and quickly tied, completely the opposite of her carefully plaited and pinned updo. The one that can withstand lifts and turns and quick changes without faltering. Everything about him seems so loose, relaxed, nonchalant. His arms hang at his sides softly, leaving himself open to the entire world. In contrast, Nesta cannot remember the last time that she couldn’t feel every muscle in her body tensed and held in precise positions.

_I usually shoot war zones_

The words flit through Nesta’s mind briefly as she pulls on a clean pair of tights and steps into her perfectly white costume. War was a messy, bloody, dirty thing, he must have at least a passable amount of talent to be able to shift his eye so quickly from that world to this one. “At least the photos will probably be good” she mumbles, spraying that one stubborn strand of hair back into its place. She grabs a brand-new pair of shiny pink pointe shoes out of the never-ending stack of boxes behind her vanity mirror labeled “Bloch size 6”.

Nesta swears again as she reaches for the box at the top of the stack, finding loose ribbon and elastic along with the shoes and sighs, remembering that the pair she just ruined was the last ones she’d sewn for rehearsal. She wasn’t supposed to need a new pair until the show opened. She grumbles as she tucks the box under her arm and grabs the sewing kit she always keeps in the top drawer.


	3. Part III: The Bargain

Part III: The Bargain

Cassian is on the stage for the first time since entering the theatre, trying to get a feel for where the light hits best and the spaces he wants to tape off for her to start and end her movements. He doesn’t hear the ballerina behind him until a loud huff echoes followed by the thud of a box. By the time he turns around she is already sitting amid a pile of pale pink ribbons and is softly marking one of the shoes with a pencil

“I forgot that I hadn’t sewn these yet” she says, not looking up or breaking her concentration as she carefully snaps the sole of the shoes back and forth before being satisfied enough to place the second mark “it won’t take long”

“They don’t come with the laces on them?”

She gives him what he is coming to think of as her signature withering stare “the _ribbons_ and _elastic_ ” she says, holding up each of a long pink satiny ribbon and a light, flesh coloured piece of elastic about the width of his thumb “have to go in a different place for every dancer, no one’s feet are exactly the same so you have to sew them on yourself” she has already threaded and poised a needle at the elastic of the first shoe as she explains this to him like a toddler. She can’t hear the constant _click click click_ of his camera over the sounds of her own voice. Gods these were going to be great shots. “It’s the same reason shoes have to be broken in, if it doesn’t mold to your unique arch properly you can break an ankle”

“Huh” he grunts “I had no idea it was so complicated”

“Of course you didn’t” she sneers exasperatedly, pulling hard on the elastic to make sure it is secure.

“Want me to do the other one?” He asks and she shoots him a glare as though he just asked her to join him in a friendly game of Russian roulette, which she might just have taken her chances on if that glare is any indication. He holds his hands up in surrender “I mean if you mark where the ribbon has to line up anyway surely I can’t ruin it that badly”

“Do you know how to sew?” She spits, eyebrows raising in a challenge

“I’ve sewed skin together” he says with a shrug

“oh really? Where? In your war zones” she rolls her eyes.

“Yes” is all he says. She catches the dark shadow that flicks through the warm gold of his eyes.

Nesta says nothing, but she hands him 2 ribbons and her already marked shoe, reaching for the other one.

“I’m Cassian, by the way” he threads the needle far quicker that she’d have thought his large hands capable of and is carefully loop stitching the first ribbon. It’s an odd sight, her tiny slipper in his giant arms “but feel free to keep calling me ‘idiot’ or ‘you’, I didn’t love ‘photo boy’. Maybe now that I’m helping you, we can upgrade it to ‘photo man’” everything he says is teasing and quick and easy.

“Do you always talk this much?” She glares at him

“Are you always such a bitch?” Nesta can’t help the laugh that explodes out of her at his quick retort. The way he says the word, no venom in it, like he is genuinely asking, curious.

“Yeah, I guess I am” she mumbles, going back to her second elastic “make sure to double stitch that, I ride my shoes pretty hard.”

Cassian grins “I bet you do”

“Pig” she scoffs, teetering a little when he throws the slipper deftly into her lap

“Hope it meets inspection, General” he smirks, half saluting her with a lazy grin as he stands up “I’m going to adjust some of the stage lights for movement before we start, watch your eyes.”

"oh now I get a warning" she mutters, his booming laugh echoes through the theatre. Nesta can feel her teeth grind together as she pulls at the stitching on the ribbons and finds it not only perfectly aligned, but stronger than the one she just finished. She bites the thread with her teeth and scowls as she ties it in several snarled knots to be sure it all stays in place.

Cassian is standing in the light booth when he catches her snarling approval at his sewing job. He can’t help but laugh as he watches her methodically crack the soles of those poor shoes before encasing her foot in some sort of beige half sock and slipping into the shoes.

The glass of the booth means that Cassian misses the moment that she steps up onto the block of the new shoes and smiles. Her real smile, not the painted on one she held earlier. She lifts her face to the lights as though it is the sun and she is basking in it after a long rain. Her feet move so quickly and gracefully as she turns and bends, gently testing the weight on each foot, bending her feet back and forth in a million ways that seem impossible to his untrained eyes.

Cassian can’t decide if he’s mad at the glass separating her from the spying eye of his camera or glad to just stand there and watch her, knowing that he would be disappointed in the photos later, knowing that he’d never capture this moment exactly. The light reflecting off her eyes, flame turned into starlight, the gentle pull of her lips into that light smile, the way he can see her chest move up and down as though she is breathing in the feeling of being free in her body.

He is deadly silent as he finishes the lighting and steps back into the theatre audience, watching her, tentative as a newborn fawn as she tests the block and then ferocious and graceful as a lioness as she throws her body into full positions. She crosses the stage in a series of quick spins and careful jumps that throw her so high into the air and spread her legs so wide that in any other circumstance he’d feel his pants tightening. Right now though, that isn’t what he is thinking. He is thinking that she looks like she is flying and floating, like an ethereal fairy with delicate wings that launch her into the air and allow her to land without a sound.

The sound of hands clapping loudly booms in her ears as it echoes through the empty theatre. Nesta has just finished a few quick combinations from Act 3, not even realizing the unbridled joy beaming from her face as she lifted her head into the end pose, until that sound reverberates through her body and the scowl is back. 

“Is there any chance you know how to do that slower?” Cassian asks, voice low and serious. With the lights slightly higher she can just make out his shape and sees that he is entirely focused on her, his camera attached to a rotating tri-pod

“Which part?”

“All of it” he breathes.

“It takes me outside of your tape though… I can’t do the whole thing in the space or I won’t get the right extension in-”

“Screw the blasted tape. If you can just move a little bit slower, I think I can capture like 10% of the magic shooting out the ends of your limbs” his hand rises to the camera “and even that is only because I am very skilled.”

She rolls her eyes at his ability to compliment himself even as he tries to flatter her. Nesta sets herself back to the upstage right corner and finds a steady spot at the downstage left corner. She flips through the different songs in her mind and settles on one with a slower tempo than the actual routine she’s performing. Perfect.

Moving slower lets Cassian capture each painstaking extension of her leg and perfectly formed pirouette. It’s only the jumps that he still can’t quite catch at the exact right second.

Nesta breathes heavily after her sixth time across the stage, feeling the painfully slow movement of her muscles start to affect her stamina.

“Do you know any other jumps?” He asks, playing with something on the camera. Nesta just nods because _duh_ and he continues “um I’m sorry I don’t know the names, but that one you did in the middle with the split thing, can you do that with an arched back?”

Nesta smiles a little, he has no idea what he has just asked “I could do Kitri’s Grande Jete from Don Quixote!” She speaks quickly and animatedly, Cassian can’t help but smile as she lights up, as if a completely different woman is standing in front of him. “We did it my first year in the company and I was way too young for the lead, but I just watched her do that jump from the background over and over again.” She pauses, smiling fondly at a distant memory “after they released us for the day, once everyone left and the only light in the whole place was from the little floor lights” Cassian looks down and sees that indeed his feet are surrounded by tiny bulbs that must help people find their seat in the dark “I stayed behind and just practiced that jump over and over and over again until the cleaners came in. I think I can still do it if you give me a couple practice runs” her eyes light up as she considers the challenge and he continues clicking away, trying so hard to capture that smile.

Nesta pulls herself back into the real world, realizing she hasn’t actually told him anything that would matter to the photo. Her voice is a little smaller as she continues “It’s like the one I do in the middle but it’s basically on an angle” her eyes are still bright “the back leg goes into attitude… like a little bend right at the knee, back arched, it’s… if I can do it properly it’s an amazing shot”

Cassian smiles broadly “yeah, give me that one” she had him convinced the second she opened her mouth.

Nesta pauses, turning to him “I want a copy” her eyes are grey again.

“huh?”

“If I manage to hold the jump long enough to get you this amazing shot for your “personal project” then I want a copy of the photo.”

“A tad egotistical, don’t you think?”

“It’s for my sister” Nesta looks down “she always asks me for photos from my dancing and I only ever have those posed ones, which are great, but she lives in Seattle and never gets all the way to New York to see me actually dance, so… I want to show her something great”

“You think my photos are going to be great?” He asks, cocky grin back in place.

“I think that you’re going to have a phenomenal model. And from the fact that your head barely fits inside of this massive theatre then you better have the skill to back it up”

“My copywrite isn’t cheap”

“If I don’t do the jump then you won’t have any photo at all”

“So, it appears we are at a stalemate, sweetheart”

“Don’t call me that” she snaps, pausing before she sighs in frustration “fine, what do you want?”

“It just so happens” he says lazily “that my studio is only a few blocks from here, and the best Italian restaurant in the city is only a few blocks from there” he pauses, watching her brows knit together as she fits the pieces of the puzzle.

“No” she folds her arms across her chest.

Cassian’s head snaps back a bit, he isn’t used to rejection. Particularly not such quick rejection “why not?”

“Because I don’t like you” she snarls

“You don’t know me” he says in his own defence “come on, let me take you to dinner after this and then I’ll print the photo off right there and if you never want to see me again you won’t have to”

“Now that last part is very tempting”

When she says nothing else and clearly isn’t going to Cassian breathes out “alright. tell you what. We’ll do the session; I’ll take the shots and you can look at them and decide. If you want to keep one then you come to dinner with me, if you don’t like any of them enough for it to be worth you while then I’ll let you watch me delete the photos and neither of us will be any better or worse for the experience.”

“Except my thighs will be burning” she grumbles, refusing to admit that his offer is fair and reasonable.

Cassian gives her an absolutely leering grin that makes Nesta’s toes curl inside of her slipper, the position causing her to rise out of instinct. She fixes him with a teasing gaze and decides that 2 can play at this game as she puts her right hand to the sole of her foot and pulls it up until it’s nestled right beside her ear “just stretching out a little” she smiles innocently .

Cauldron boil him this woman is going to drive him insane. The only thing that brings him back to earth is a perfect shot of that delicate foot right beside her seductively smirking face.

“Once you’re done might I suggest trying to get the other one off the ground too? That way I’d be a whole lot closer to winning this wager”

Nesta scowls, picking up her left leg for the same stretch before straightening her spine and moving to the other side of the stage. She takes a deep breath and does a few careful jazz runs to get the momentum into a quick-

“damnit” she says, annoyed as her left leg refuses to hitch high enough

“that looked pretty damn good to me” the man in the audience drawls

“that’s because you know nothing about ballet. Let me try again”.

‘again’ turns into 4 more times before she is confident in the proper arch of her back and bend of her knee. Cassian feels something different in her posture as she moves to that same spot again, and while he thought she had done the other jumps perfectly, he can feel something come alive in the tips of his fingers as they press the shutter button. She flies, there is no other way to describe what the woman in front of him is doing. She takes off of one leg, sending it straight out in front of her and soars through the air for several seconds as her back arches, head nearly hitting the pointed end of her perfectly curved back leg, and he catches it. The exact moment that a woman became something more than human.

She reminds him of a swan in so many ways, he thinks, beautiful and graceful but cold, snippy, temperamental, definitely willing to attack. The way her body bends back, legs perfectly in sync, face a serene mask of careful concentration, making it look effortless. In this moment she is more than human, she has taken flight.

“ok, one more” she says the second she lands, and he scoffs.

“No, come look at this. Now.” He has already flipped the display screen to the exact imagine he felt shudder through his body as he hit the button.

“let’s do it a couple more times so there’s more to choose fro-”

“Now” he says again, and it is not a question.

Nesta slowly eases off the stage and Cassian meets her halfway, holding the display screen out to her.

Nesta’s face is stuck in only one second of complete awe before the scowl takes over her features again and she shoves the camera back at him.

“Fine, we can get dinner.” Cassian grins at the victory, but she isn’t done yet “but I swear to the Mother so much as one crack about positions or flexibility and I will snap your memory card in half while you cry and beg” he opens his mouth to reply and she holds up a hand “nope. Don’t even try it. I’ve heard them all, they aren’t sexy or endearing. They are unoriginal and uninspired.”

The gleam in his eye tells her that he’s taking her statement as more of a challenge than a threat and she is about to let him know how much she is not joking when her right thigh cramps up and she scowls, rubbing the muscle

“At least the photo is halfway decent, otherwise this spasm would _not_ be worth it”

“Happy to give you another massage and move up higher this time” he grins

“I told you no sleezy comments”

“No, you said no comments about positions or flexibility. I mentioned neither.” He steps a little closer, forcing her gaze to meet his “you said nothing uncreative or uninspired, and I think that the prospect of working all those knots out of every muscle in your far too tight body is… _very_ inspired” Nesta blinks, taking her hand off of her thigh, lips parting just a little-

“Am I interrupting something?” Lucien walks onto the stage, adjusting the waistband on his black tights, fully costumed and ready to go.

“No” Nesta says frostily “you are interrupting absolutely nothing”

Cassian just grins, turning to face the new dancer “you must be Rothbart” Lucien nods and Nesta’s eyes flash to his, impressed by both his memory and pronunciation and a little surprised that he was actually listening when she was rambling about the plot of the show “alright I’m going to head into the audience, you guys just… pretend I’m not here and start the _magic_ ”

Nesta catches the photographer’s quick wink as she moves to the opposite side of the stage from Lucien. She smirks a little to herself as she slides into position, realizing this man is nowhere near prepared for just how up-close and personal _certain_ lifts can get.


	4. Part IV: The Studio

Part IV: At the Studio

“I can’t go for dinner with you after all” Nesta says after she is sure Lucien is back in his dressing room and cannot hear them

“why not?”

“Because I didn’t realize you were going to make us do that routine 4 billion times and now I am a sweaty mess. I also just realized that I didn’t bring a different shirt since it was so bloody hot when I got on the subway this morning that I just wore a pair of shorts over my body suit”

“And?” he fixes her with a crooked grin, looking up and down her tights-and body suit clad body, the cumbersome tutu having been abandoned an hour ago so she didn’t mess it up as he kept them there for his ‘personal project’ yet again.

“ _and”_ she rolls her eyes “I’m not going into a restaurant sweaty and half naked”

He just shrugs “ok so we’ll get takeout- I can order while you change your shoes and stuff then we can eat at the studio”

“it doesn’t bother _you_ that I’m-” she gestures vaguely

“No, call me crazy, but it really doesn’t bother me that you’re going to be hot and sweaty and in a skintight dance outfit”

Nesta narrows her eyes “you aren’t nearly as charming as you think you are, you know”

He balks out a laugh at that “yes I am, but the fact that you don’t think so just makes it all the more fun.”

“If I’d known that all I had to do was pretend to be charmed in order to get you off my back I would’ve tried that hours ago”

“No, you wouldn’t have” he says it seriously and she lets out a low hmm as they both come to the conclusion that she would not have been capable of such a feat.

“You’re right, I wouldn’t have. Far too difficult” she gathers up the forgotten costume in her arms so she can hang it up again before she leaves.

When Nesta comes back out of her dressing room she is indeed still wearing that sinfully tight grey bodysuit, and a pair of loose Nike track shorts hanging off of her hips. Cassian subconsciously licks his lips at the sight of her long, bare legs, no longer covered by those light pink tights. He follows the line of her leg all the way down to her simple black flats and chuckles a little. Of course she’d wear ballet flats even outside of the theatre. What strikes him most though is the way her hand is softly running through her long, dark golden hair, which is now flowing in loose waves around her shoulders, curtesy of the earlier braids. As if she can tell that he’s staring, Nesta grabs an elastic off her wrist and sweeps her hair into a high ponytail “I have to leave the pins here or I'll forget them at home” she murmurs in explanation, moving towards the door.

“Wrong way” he catches her wrist just as she is passing him on the red-carpeted stairs

“What? The exit is that way” she points to the main theatre doors, looking at him as though he is the stupidest man to ever live.

“Yes, but the parking lot is that way” he points down and to her left, where indeed she knows the loading bay and parking area are

“Seriously? Who the hell drives in New York, especially a couple blocks”

“People who lug around 300 pounds of photography equipment so that they can catch shots good enough to get them dates” he jokes, rearranging the 3 giant canvas bags that currently hang off of his arms and shoulders.

“Glad to know that blackmailing women into suffering your company is a common occurrence for you” she sniffs, marching in front of him to the correct doors.

It is only when she gets to the parking lot and realizes that she has no idea what his car looks like or where to go from here that she turns back to him.

“Wait” she puts her hand up to stop him in his tracks “I want to guess which one is yours” she gestures to the sparse cars lining the small, private lot. He just gives her an indulgent smile and she turns back to the options in front of her.

The first 2 she knows belong to the director and owner of the theatre so she crosses those off “hmm, the black one is a two seater, too small for the equipment” she says to herself, scanning over a shiny sports car “that silver one is a total girl car” she scans right past the new-looking shiny silver sedan “even you aren’t stupid enough to own a pickup truck when you live in the city” she scoffs at the monster vehicle at the edge of the lot.

“I do think that’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me” she rolls her eyes “as much as I love to see your sensitive side, sweetheart, these are fairly heavy” he adjusts the bags again

“shut up you and your giant biceps can handle it” the words are out of her mouth before she can stop them and she dutifully ignores his grin “I’m going to get this”

“That one!” she points at a black hatch-back with a sleek looking front and a light layer of dust. Enough room for everything he needs, but still small enough for living downtown, a dark, neutral colour but not impossibly shiny like the ones owned by people who have nothing to do all day. Not old, but not terribly new either. It makes perfect sense.

Cassian has to agree that her guess is excellent, even as he walks past her and leisurely removes the key from his pocket, clicking a button to pop the trunk of-

“The girl car, I believe you called it”

Nesta shrugs, a little annoyed at being wrong, but intrigued by what else she might be reading incorrectly in this seeming brute of a man “I’m not wrong”

“Whatever you say, sweetheart” he closes the trunk, slipping around to open the passenger side door “now get in, our food is probably already waiting on the doorstep because of your little detour”

“You ordered already?”

“I said I was going to while you changed”

“You never asked what I wanted!”

“I didn’t have to”

“How presumptuous” she crosses her arms “I could be a vegan or something”

“Are you?” he asks with a raised brow.

“well no” she admits “but I don’t eat red meat!”

He laughs “not a problem”

When Cassian turns his car into the underground parking lot of a high-rise glass apartment building on W 71st and Riverside Blvd she raises her eyebrows “I thought we were going to a studio?”

“We are”

“In a giant skyscraper apartment building on the Upper West side?”

He just winks “you’ll see”

After parking in a large stall, he grabs the equipment from the trunk and passes Nesta his key fob “my hands are full and this thing can be so finicky- just hit it against the door and then the other one and then press 24 on the elevator”

Still skeptical and feeling unsure Nesta pauses “is this the part where you lure me into a locked soundproof “studio” and murder me then drop me in the Hudson river, which is conveniently close I might add.”

“If my intent was to murder you, I probably wouldn’t have given _you_ the keys or be weighing myself down with all this equipment” he points out and she has to grudgingly agree. “and the river being so close is really just a view bonus” he says as the elevator door springs open on the 24th floor, indeed displaying a wide window with sweeping views of the Hudson and only 2 large doors, one on either end of the hallway.

“Which one?”

He gestures to the right “bigger key is for the studio” he says, and she opens the door for him, taking everything in herself not to gasp as she enters the massive space.

Real hardwood floors and almost entirely floor to ceiling windows make Nesta feel as though she could step forward and fall right into the river. There are tarps and lights and giant prints all over and at least 4 more doors leading to different rooms- including a… kitchen?

“Do you like it?”

She just stares at him “why is there a kitchen in your studio?”

He laughs “I’ve considered having it removed about a hundred times, but I always leave an absolute mess in here and I figure I might as well cook here too and keep my apartment clean” he shrugs, lining the bags up against a wall as she continues gazing out the window

“It’s breathtaking” she says “but why-”

He senses her question “my brother bought the penthouse of this building for he and his fiancé a few years ago. She loves New York and he said it was a good investment, so my other brother and I bought this floor. He’s always gone somewhere for work so I turned this into my studio and live in his place across the hall, though he obviously still has his bedroom and everything set up in there, but” he shrugs “it just makes sense to do it this way”

Nesta nods dumbly, thinking about the idea that millions and millions of dollars of real estate is something to him that ‘just makes sense’. Instead what she chooses to comment on is “I have 2 sisters.”

He grins “technically my brothers and I aren’t related by blood, but we all have either dead or shit parents, so may as well be” she is shocked by how open he is, how free. No shame or walls or pretence in anything he says. She is about to comment when his phone rings “and that will be our food”

The large man flits right by her and is in the elevator before she can blink. Alone. She is alone in his studio and she could…

There are a lot of things she could do alone in this space, but instead she settles on trying to find the bathroom.

She picks the wrong door. Nesta blinks a few times for her eyes to adjust to the orangey glow of the dark room… literally, it’s… a dark room, for developing photos. She knows that she shouldn’t be looking, shouldn’t be invading his private space, but she can’t help it. These photos are different than the ones out in the open. They are… stunning, in the most carnal sense of the word. Horrifying, but.. beautiful. He wasn’t lying about beginning his career in a war zone. The scenes before her are grim and bloody and dark, but they all have a strange amount of comfort that she just can’t put her finger on. She isn’t afraid to look at them. Nesta is surprised by the size of the room and continues farther and farther in. When she comes to one of the back walls she sees it. The images aren’t dark room developed so he doesn’t need to keep it in here, but he does. He hides it away, because this is it. The personal project she’s heard so much about.

“I call it humanity” a deep voice sounds from behind her, she whips around, apology in her eyes.

“I-I’m sorry, I’ shouldn’t have, I was looking for the bathroom but then I got the wrong door and I was just” she pauses, and he lets her, staring heatedly down at her, not filling the silence “mesmerized” she admits, dragging her gaze to meet his

He nods, not chastising her, but not letting her off the hook for snooping either. He merely flips the camera that is strung across his back to the front and plays with the buttons for a few agonizing moments of silence.

“There” he points to the middle-left pane of the giant printed canvas before her “I’m going to put the final piece there” he says, stepping forward to hold the camera screen in front of the empty space.

A sharp inhale is Nesta’s only reaction to the imagine of her own feet, not in a perfect ballet position, but one pointed and the other in the middle of falling, her weight collapsing beneath her, muscles quivering, and shoe bloodied.

“I never wanted it to be this horrible piece of war, I wanted to show the… the-”

“the beauty in the bloodshed” she says quietly “the wars that rage every day, because… because a battlefield isn’t the only time people feel that way” she’s muttering the words, saying them to herself and not to him as she brings her fingers to trace along the blended images. Soldiers on the battlefield beside Indian slums beside an opera singer coughing up blood still in her emerald gown beside a sterile operating field beside a bloody knife hacking at the infected arm of an enemy soldier. _Humanity_ , she thinks. In all of its most ugly and beautiful parts.

“Were you a soldier?” she asks, turning to him with a newfound curiosity

“Now that is a question that I need at least a couple of drinks in me to answer” he says, moving back toward the light of the doorframe “no red meat, but how do you feel about red wine?”


	5. Part V: The Fire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updating 2 at once because I needed them broken up, but I also think they have to go together, so... enjoy (hopefully)!

**Part V: The Fire**

Nesta hates that she lets out a small moan as the creamy, rich, decadent pasta passes her lips. She hates that he did in fact know exactly what to order her and wants to pretend to hate it just so he doesn’t get the idea in his head that he can be so presumptuous in the future.

_The future?_ Did she really just think that?

“and you haven’t even put the extra truffle shavings on yet” Cassian smirks, lifting a small plastic container out of the to go bag. He pops the top off and sprinkles the finely chopped black truffle over her mass of noodles, cream sauce, and porcini mushrooms. Nesta takes another bite and can feel her eyes close in pleasure.

“Don’t flatter yourself too much” she snips immediately “I’m practically starving since someone kept me at the theatre several hours past the intended end of the shoot”

“Yeah, I’m sure that’s it” he winks at her “and not that I have impeccable taste and you are trying to keep yourself from admitting it” his perceptiveness is infuriating as he twirls his fork around the long noodles bathed in rosé sauce and chicken that he balances on his lap. The studio doesn’t have an actual dining room, so they are sitting on cushions in front of the window, looking out at the river.

Nesta takes another sip of her wine, which is also annoyingly good “so when do I get to see the photos?”

“After dinner” he smirks, purposefully moving his fork incredibly slowly “when did you start dancing?”

“I don’t really remember a time when I haven’t danced” she admits “when I was young it was all about my mom. She had me in ballet slippers before I could even walk. She always wanted a beautiful little ballerina for a daughter. Poised and disciplined and talented in a respectable, artistic sort of way. She did that with all of us actually, when she found out how my younger sisters could paint and garden as they do, she pounced immediately, wanting us to be proper cultured young ladies” she snorts a little at the end.

“So, you became a ballerina because of her?”

“In spite of her, really” she continues staring out the window, taking another large sip of wine “she died when I was 12 and I quit dance for a while just out of anger that she’d forced me to do it for so long and then had the nerve to die on me, which sounds stupid I know-”

“It doesn’t” he breaks in “I mean, I get it. The grief coming out as anger.”

Her lip quirks up the tiniest amount in what may be, on someone else’s face, an understanding smile. “Anyway that lasted about a month before I realized how much I missed it. No matter the reason, it was the one thing I always knew. I used to sneak into the studio and blast these loud, booming symphonies that they would never let us actually build a routine to and just let myself be angry or sad or… whatever I was feeling. I’d dance through it, and then… I knew how to express that emotion, how to feel it deep in my body without anyone knowing it was there” she takes another quick sip of wine, brow furrowing in a contemplative scowl “I.. I don’t know why I’m telling you all of this. It’s honestly a pretty stupid coping mechanism and-”

“It’s not” he says quickly, setting down his almost finished pasta to move a little closer “I have seen every coping mechanism on this earth from the people I was deployed with, I went through most of them myself after my first tour. Drinking, drugs, women, you name it. It wasn’t until I stopped trying to find ways to numb and forget that pain and instead took control of it, expressed it, that I was really able to move on. I-” he pauses “I couldn’t escape it unless I kept it right beside me”

“So you started taking photos” she says quietly and he nods "walking beside death instead of running away from it". Cassian doesn't admit just how right she is, he isn't ready to acknowledge how her words slice right to the core of him. They sit in silence for a moment, her finishing off the pasta, him just staring at her, thinking of all the different ways he wants to photograph her, thinking of what his lens could catch if he were a fly on the wall as she let herself go, let herself feel that music she was talking about.

“Why did you join the army in the first place?”

Cassian looks away from her for the first time in minutes, realizing that before he said it she didn’t actually know. Suspected, but didn’t know. It feels weird, having to tell her these things when there is something so far deep inside of him that just… knows her. “There are a lot of answers to that question” he leans back onto his forearms, legs spreading in front of him “mom died when I was little, barely remember her. Dad was a deadbeat, never met him. Bounced around in the system a bit until I met my first brother at school- he was a total spoiled rich kid. I hated him the second I saw him, and we fought. I kicked his ass by the way, though he'd never admit to it now” he chuckles a little and Nesta can’t believe the ease with which he relives all of this trauma, talks about it as though it is nothing “his mom showed up at the principal’s office, pissed as hell. Naturally my social worker was late and… she got one look at me, this beaten down, broken, scrappy little mess of a kid in worn out jeans and old shoes and… well, I never went back to a foster home.”

“She sounds incredible”

“She was” he smiles at the memory “a few years later one of her best friend’s died and she took in my second brother. She was an amazing woman, full of love and compassion. She cared for us all as if we were her own. He husband, however…” and then the towering 6’3 mass of muscle in front of her shudders, actually shudders as if he is afraid “I turned 18 a week after she was murdered and I just… I had to get away. I couldn’t’ look at my brothers even, didn’t think I belonged there anymore. So I signed up for my first tour and I grew up, a lot” he pauses, emptying half of his wine glass in one swallow “I signed up for the second one because I didn’t’ know what else to do with my life, and because I needed something to stop me from spinning off the rails since I got back to the US with newfound trauma and having never dealt with the grief of losing the closest thing to a mother I’d ever really known, but it was worse. So much worse. Bloody and-” he shakes his head “anyway, I needed a way to cope with it and that’s when the photos started”

“I ran away once, too” the words are quiet, practically imperceptible and muttered into her wine glass

“The way I see it, you don’t owe anything to anyone when you’re grieving”

“Not even family?”

Cassian shrugs “I left my brothers behind when I enlisted”

“Something tells me your brothers weren’t 14 and 15 when you left” she looks out at the river again, ice filling her gaze so fully that he thinks she might just freeze the water in place “anyway, I didn’t leave because of my mom or grief, I left to come here” everything that Cassian has experienced with this girl makes him think she is done talking, won’t be elaborating, but she continues on a hard voice “after my mom died my father… changed. He lost everything we had and I just ignored it all. My youngest sister got a job and tried to help, but I just… danced. I helped out teaching classes to kids, so the studio let me stay in my own classes for free, and I used it to never be home. Then when I turned 17 I got a scholarship to the New York Ballet Academy and I… I never looked back.”

Cassian’s jaw is set a little tight, something burning in his eyes that she can’t quite place, but he listens “you still love your sisters though, that much is obvious”

“I don’t know that love is enough” something breaks her out of the trance and she turns back to him “but speaking of sisters, I believe I was promised a photo once we finished eating dinner”

Cassian nods, acquiescing to her obvious attempt to shift topics. He springs onto his feet and offers her a hand that she does not take. He laughs a little at the rebuff and moves toward his computer.

“I still can’t believe this is me” Nesta murmurs as she watches the glossy image slowly process out of the giant digital printer. She isn’t only talking about the photo, all of it. The things that she has told him, the way she answered his painful stories with her own, it wasn’t like her to feel so… comfortable.

“I can’t believe that no one has ever caught you like this” Cassian looks at her from the computer “honestly, you made a bad deal. Once I saw that first jump, I was about ready to sign over my first born if you would just let me keep taking photos of you” his omission of the word _dancing_ after the word _you_ is clear to both of them

“I wouldn’t want your first born” she replies lazily to mask the blush slowly creeping up her cheeks “it would probably be a loud, whiny thing with a giant head”

Cassian laughs, pulling the image fully out of the printer and handing it to her “then what could I offer you? To get you to see me again?”

His hand ignites her fingers with flame and sparks as his skin brushes against hers for the first time. Nesta is caught in the moment, the energy, the feeling of his large, muscular, body so close to hers. So warm, a part of her is thinking about just how perfectly her head might fit into the crook of his neck, how amazing it would feel to fold herself into those arms and let the warmth seep into her bones, and then her eyes snap back to the image and something catches in her throat. She feels like she is about to suffocate. She takes a step back “you don’t want someone like me”

“A beautiful, brilliant, talented woman?” his words are not light and sarcastic, he is not teasing her, and he isn’t trying to harm her. Something has changed in the air because he is looking right at her, those golden extensions of his camera lens trying to capture a snapshot of her soul. He is trying to peer right inside of her and lay her open and bare and exposed on his canvas sheet. Something that Nesta can simply not allow

“A bitch” she sets her jaw, throwing his words from earlier back at him.

Cassian’s mouth quirks up a little, but he doesn’t break the intensity of his stare. His hand reaches to press that single, persistently wayward strand of hair back behind her ear and then he leaves his hand resting on her cheek, holding her face in his palm “maybe that is _exactly_ what I want”

Nesta steps back, breaking the contact sharply “listen, I don’t do… this” she waves her hands around vaguely “with the food and the wine and the compliments and the oh-too-casual millionaires randomly trying to get something out of me. It’s not my thing, and I’m not that girl so… get a new gig and pick another ballerina” she tucks the photo under her arm and turns to leave, but he is standing between her and the door so she has to brush swiftly past him in order to make her escape.

Cassian’s hand reaches out to grasps her wrist tightly and Nesta just stamps her foot and rolls her eye because really, could any of this get more cliché “Look, _Mr. Grey_ ” she seethes “I’m not sure exactly what sort of angle you are playing at here, but I’m pretty sure I made it clear that I am _not_ interested”

He can feel her words aimed straight at his heart, and he blocks each one, dodging the accusations that aren’t really made for him. He’s seen enough wounded animals to know the look of one when it stands in front of him, to see the angry baring of her teeth and sharpening of claws for what it is- fear.

“Who hurt you?” Cassian drops her wrist as he whispers the words.

It is only a second that she drops her defences. A split second, less than the click of a camera that she drops her mask, but he sees it. The slight openness of her mouth, the flush in her collarbones, the widening of her eyes, grey overtaking blue

“give me a name” he growls

“Why?” her shields are fully back up “so you can get your saviour complex rocks off? Drop the bad man at the bottom of the river and save the poor, scared little girl? Well newsflash, I never ordered a knight in shining Armani” she emphasized her words with a swift push against his chest, Cassian stumbles back a little out of sheer surprise “I didn’t need someone to save me then, and I sure as hell don’t need a _stranger_ trying to pull some vigilante bullshit now”

“Not everything that everyone says and does is a fucking insult, Nesta!” his voice raises, and it is the first time he hasn’t seemed light and easy. The green in his eyes fades a little, molten gold swirling in anger “you’ve got baggage, so does everyone. It doesn’t give you an excuse to bite my head off”

“I told you that you didn’t want me” her voice is cold and quiet.

“That’s bullshit” he steps even closer to her, chests almost touching “I bet you say that to every man that tries to get inside those brick walls you’ve built, don’t you? You scare them off with your ice-queen glare and your sharp insults” he rolls his anger-filled eyes “well I’m not buying it, so you’re going to have to try a little bit harder than that” He holds his arms out, a challenge “go on, hit me with your best shot, because I have dived into trenches to avoid bullets raining down on me and watched men have entire limbs hacked off with nothing but a bottle of cheap liquor for anesthesia, so your insults are reading just a little _weak_ , sweetheart”

“You’re a prick”

“I’ve been called worse, and that’s by the people who like me, so try again” his gaze is set and heavy, intense as he eggs her on. The sheer focus behind his eyes tells her that she could fight this battle all night and still end up at a stalemate.

“Why are you bothering with all of this” she scoffs “don’t you have anything better to do?”

“Of course I do, but this isn’t over and I’m not letting you walk away”

“Why not?”

He takes a breath, staring down at her, taking in the textbook perfection that he saw the second he first laid eyes on her. He isn’t sure how he missed the defiance that swims through her body like a current of white-hot fire, bubbling just beneath the surface. A photographer’s eye should have caught the tense set of her jaw, the tight lock in her knees, the perpetual narrowing of her eyes- like a lioness, constantly sizing up her prey, no- on the lookout for predators. The tight curl of her fingers into her own palms. She is like a weapon, trigger pulled tight, fully loaded, no safety.

“Because you obviously have no idea what I want” he says quietly

“Someone to yell at you? If this is some weird fetish then I-”

“Stop doing that” he cuts her off, interrupting her deflection mid-sentence, daringly placing his hand under her chin to lift her gaze to his, forcing her eyes to connect with his before she hurls another insult “I don’t think you’re broken” he says, cutting through her walls and façade as if it is nothing “I think that you have been thrown into a fire and you came out burning white hot and cracking and ready to give the world hell” he pauses for just a second “and it’s a feeling that I understand”

Nesta’s mouth falls open before her mind has formed any words to respond “I might still be in the fire” is what finally falls out, not entirely by her own choice.

Cassian raises a single eyebrow and she suddenly notices the shallow scar on his forehead “I don’t care” he drops her chin, but she holds his gaze. “Burn me alive, if you must.”


	6. Part VI: The Aftermath

**Part VI: The Aftermath**

“So, I’m pretty sure I met Feyre’s sister” Cassian throws himself onto the giant grey sofa in his actual living space. It wasn't so hard to put the pieces together. Nesta isn't all that common of a name, the 2 sisters, mom dying, dad losing everything. Sure it was a story that happened to a lot of people in the recession, but somehow he just... knew.

“Huh? Why are you in Seattle?” Rhys asks, clearly distracted and Cassian feels one more piece of the puzzle click together. Gods it was like the universe was connecting him to this woman on purpose, intertwining their fates and using their blasted siblings to do it.

“Not that one” an exacerbated sigh

There’s a long pause on the other side and the Rhysand starts to laugh, full on, out loud, laugh. “and how did _that_ go for you, brother?”

“So you’ve met her”

“Feyre always insists on dinner when we’re in the city, she damn near cut my balls off the last time”

“I know the feeling” Cassian grumbles

“eh chin up, she always just avoids talking to me in group settings as much as she can so I’m sure you will be graced with the same treatment.”

Except that Cassian didn’t _want_ her to ignore him. He wanted her to walk into his apartment and let him peel that body suit off of her with his teeth. He wanted her to dance naked in front of the giant glass windows and let him photograph every perfect bend and curve in her body. He wanted to sit in front of a fire with her on a cold winter night and listen to every thought she has inside her head. He wanted to-

“Have you ever seen her dance?” he mumbles, almost involuntarily, when he realizes that he hadn’t responded to Rhys’ earlier statement.

“What?” distraction again as Cassian hears the unmistakable jingling of keys and twist of a lock “oh um no, but Feyre is insisting we fly back stateside in August for some show- apparently it’s a really big deal and Nesta never invites anyone to stuff like this so… I guess I’ll be in New York to bug you soon”

“Swan lake” Cassian says into the phone “the show, it’s swan lake. She’s dancing the lead” he pauses “well _leads_ , I guess”

“uh hu” Rhys says slowly, in a way that makes Cassian realize what he just said, how he said it.

“shut up”

“No, no, why don’t you go on. Tell me all about the show, the parts, do you happen to know what Nesta’s tutu looks like as well?” his voice is teasing, and Cassian already knows what is about to happen by the way his brother raised his voice on her name.

“who is that?” sure enough a faded, mumbled female voice is barely audible

“Cass” Rhys responds and then there is a small noise of protest as the phone is wrestled out of his hand.

“Why are you talking about my sister?”

“Hello to you too, Feyre. Long time no chat, how have you been? Enjoying Spain?”

“I talked to you last week about Spain” the ' _now starts talking about my sister'_ is implied

“Well as you know, I dabble in the photographic arts” he can practically feel her roll her eyes through the phone “and my exquisite talents were commissioned by the New York Ballet for their upcoming production. Low and behold right up on stage is this viciously talented Medusa who just about broke my camera lens with her glare, that was my first hint she was an Archeron.” Feyre snorts in derision “and then she mentions 2 sisters” he lays out the path to his determination like an Agatha Christie novel “and then so many more little details just clicked into place over dinner-”

Long pause. Long, long pause. “What?” another long pause “you went on a date with my sister?”

“Not exactly” he scoffs “is it a date if one person is blackmailed to be there?”

“If not then you’ve never been on a date in your life” Rhys jumps back into the conversation, clearly having been listening over Feyre’s shoulder the whole time “ow” Cassian hears a smack, obviously courtesy of Feyre.

“Nesta went out with you?” she asks again, shock in her voice.

“Careful, you’re going to hurt my feelings if you continue to sound so very shocked”

“It’s just… Nesta doesn’t…”

“Yeah, I got that. Hence the blackmail.”

“Did you… I mean, did you guys?” she trails off and Cassian laughs out loud

“gods Feyre of course not, I’m pretty sure if we had she would’ve bit my head off after like a black widow spider and I wouldn’t be talking to you right now” he pauses, a grin pulling at the corners of his mouth “she’s incredible.”

“That’s one word for Nesta”

“and she’s trying to blow me off, so what do I say to-”

“Oh no. No no no. I am not getting involved in this” Feyre’s voice is firm “Nesta hasn’t really dated since…” she trails off and again those same warning bells are going off in his mind. What the hell happened with her and this other man “anyway, you can try and then when you fail I’ll be there in a month and you can cry on my shoulder”

“Fine” Cassian grumbles “but I’m not going to fail”

“Of course you aren’t. Goodbye, Cassian”

“Bye. Oh, and Feyre”

“Yeah?”

“You should get Elain a plane ticket to come see the show with you, if she can.”

* * *

Nesta rolls her eyes as she steps off the subway, annoyance clouding her tone as she starts the short walk to her apartment, photo tucked safely under her arm “no, I’m not joking El. That’s exactly what he said. _Burn me alive_ , who the fuck is this guy anyway? Who just says everything that pops into their head like that, it was seriously weird” she shakes her head “anyway, I just had to let you know the many ways in which I had to suffer in order to obtain a surprise for you. I’m mailing it tonight; you’ll have it next week”

Elain’s laugh is light and happy on the other end of the phone “I don’t know, sounds kind of hot” she pauses “pun intended” and even Nesta can’t help but release a small chuckle at her sister’s terrible joke “so are you going to see him again?”

“I don’t know, I doubt it” Nesta says honestly “I pretty much tucked and ran right after the whole blaze of fire thing and… it’s just complicated. Relationships and people and emotions are all so complicated. I don’t have time right now”

“You’ve been saying that since you broke it off with Tomas” oh Elain, sweet, beautiful Elain who she would never in a million years tell the truth of what happened between her and her ex-fiance.

“Yeah and I should’ve been saying it before him too” she’s careful to keep the words light and teasing, just a girl complaining to her sister about a crappy ex. No hurt or scars allowed. It is the sheer force of will inside of her own mind that keeps the haunting images at bay. That man will _not_ enter her thoughts now, she can not be distracted by him. Not when she already almost told someone else today. “Anyway, I have good reason to be saying it now. The show opens in a month. This is not the time to be letting some man get me fat on pasta and make me lose my focus.”

“mmm, trust me, it’s always a good time to get fat on pasta” Elain laughs “and if you’re worried about fitting into your costume, there are plenty of activities for 2 that could help you burn off the calories”

“Yeah, like open field sword fighting not using practice blades”

Elain laughs again “ok remember how I called you saying it was slow? Well now it’s practically deserted. Too much rain I guess, even for Seattle” she sighs “I’m just closing up the booth, no use in me freezing out here when nobody else is- so I should probably go.”

Elain owns a small florist booth in a primo spot in Pike Place Market. On nice days she adores the little sliver of ocean she can see and she loves to talk to all of the people who stopped by. Nesta always marvelled at how Elain could charge 50% more than every other booth and still have a line up around the corner. Her flowers were the best, obviously, but mostly it was just… her. People wanted to stop and talk to her and then she would tell them where in her garden all the flowers grew, what each of them meant ‘red tulips for undying love’ she would sigh at young couples until those boys practically turned their pockets inside out to buy fistfuls of tulips. On days like this, however, where she was barely sheltered from the torrential downpour, she’d rather be at home.

“I’m just walking up to my door and I have about 2 weeks of laundry waiting for me so I should go too.”

“Ok, talk to you soon. Love you”

“love you too”

* * *

When Nesta walks into her dressing room the next morning she is beyond tired. A restless night meant that she dragged herself up at 4am when she realized she wasn’t going to sleep anyway and by 5 she was in the theatre. The security guard just nodded at her, and how unfazed he was made Nesta realize that maybe she comes in at 5am a little too often. Oh well, she could use a damn good stretch and still needed to break in the arch on those new shoes a little more before they’d be able to handle a full day of rehearsals.

She flicks the light on in her dressing room and immediately narrows in on a large portfolio-style envelope that definitely wasn’t there when she left last night. Nesta drops her small gym bag onto the ground and picks it up with both hands, seeing a message scrawled on the back in-surprisingly delicate- handwriting.

_Dear: Sugar Plum Fairy,_

_I know you wanted the photo for your sister, but I thought that you should have a copy too. Don’t worry, I had the security guy put this in here, I didn’t snoop through your stuff so please hold the law suits!_

_Ps- should you feel so grateful that you want to join me for dinner again, I also know a great place for French food, and we could actually go to the restaurant this time._

_212-501-2687_

Nesta rolls her eyes, not sure if she should be focusing on the annoying nickname, the dinner invitation, or the fact that he somehow has a 212 area code? Do the phone companies even give those out anymore? Instead of thinking about any of that, she pulls the glossy print out of the envelope and smiles. She never would have admitted it, but she was a little sad to part with the photo, even if it might be narcissistic. Even as she places the photo gently back in the envelope and banishes it to the side of her vanity desk while she carefully pins and sprays her hair up and back, she can feel that phone number haunting her, following her like the eyes of the Mona Lisa.

To get her mind off of it Nesta grabs her shoes and strides through the path to the stage. She puts her Air Pods in, sets her phone on the ground and everything that is not inside of her own body disappears. She stretches every limb and muscle in her body until they won’t possibly move any farther, and then she plays a symphony.

Loud, clashing symbols fill her ears and her body starts to move. The music isn’t delicate or sweet or beautiful, it is a mass of strings plucked to breaking and drums beating like gorilla’s fists on its chest. Nesta’s body doesn’t even belong to her mind anymore as she moves across the stage, taking up every square inch of space that she can, moving in fast, flowing motions that lack the precision required for ballet. She can feel her heart bursting with the crescendo of the symbols inside her chest, and then she looks to the wings and stops immediately, ripping the headphones from her ears.

The intruder raises his hands up in mock surrender “I was just planning to go over that finale fouetté sequence I keep messing up. Obviously it was a pipe dream to think I’d beat you here and have the stage to myself”

Nesta fixes him with an icy glare “it was. I’m here hours early basically every day, which is probably why I can manage 32 fouettés en pointe in the black swan sequence while you’re struggling to keep proper timing with your 16”

“Sorry we can’t all be perfect hard plastic dolls at the top of a music box who do nothing but dance all day every day”

“What else is there to do that could possibly be more important?”

“I don’t know, family, friends, dating”

Nesta narrows her eyes further “my sister and her fiancé are coming to the show.”

The topic change is abrupt and just as his words on her lack of a life outside the theatre were meant to hit hard, hers were calculated like a punch to his chest. If Nesta were someone else she might feel a little bad about how absolutely shattered the man in front of her looks at her words, how plainly it is written across his face.

“I didn’t realize-”

“Last month, in Paris” Nesta enjoys the look on his face “right underneath the Arc de Triumph and covered by a blanket of stars like it was out of a damn movie”

“She always did want big things, your sister.” 

“Things like freedom and respect? Yeah, call her crazy.”

Tamlin growls at her and she just shrugs. Part of her has always felt a little guilty about Feyre and Tamlin’s relationship. It never would have happened if Nesta hadn’t run off to the ballet academy. This man disgusted her from the moment she met him in her first class, 3 years older and already taking small solos in productions. A big brute of a man who shouldn’t be able to move with the grace and precision that he does, and he knew it. It irked her, so of course on Feyre’s first visit to New York they fell madly in love… for about a year.

“People will be here to start rehearsal in an hour, and you really do have to practice” she switches topics smoothly, again. “Put the music on, I need to break in my shoes anyway, I’ll do the turns beside you, watch my timing” she may hate his guts, but she’ll be damned if one single part of this show is not exactly perfect. He has it in him, annoyingly she knows that he does, and she also knows that watching her absolutely lap him will send him into enough of a rage that he’ll make sure those turns work.

“Thanks” he mumbles insincerely, moving to start the music.

Nesta counts the beats as he walks back to the stage “and Tamlin” he looks up at her, deftly jumping the few feet from audience to stage “if you do see my sister before or after the show, and you say so much as one word to her, I will rip out your intestines and grind your bones beneath my shoe like resin” and then she’s launched into a never-ending string of turns, challenging him to just try and keep up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you all liked this! I'm constantly playing around with Feyre and Rhysand as characters. I think they have a lot of potential and can be a lot of fun, but they also both piss me off a lot in the books sometimes, so we are just going to throw them in to have fun and spice things up a little between our reluctant leads ;)


	7. Part VII: The Run-In

**Part VII: The Run-In**

“You have to go out with this man again” Elain practically screeches into the phone when Nesta finally picks up after 3 missed calls.

“I’m glad you like the photo ‘Lain” she mumbles sleepily, turning to look at the clock on her bedside table. It’s 4:30am in New York, about the time Nesta normally wakes up, but that means that it is 1:30am in Seattle. “what are you doing still awake?”

“Oh the market didn’t close until midnight so I just got home and opened the mail and come on, Like it? It’s stunning. Not just you, which obviously you are beautiful and amazing and I don’t even know how a body bends like that, but also just… the way he did it” Elain sighs in that sweet way of hers “it’s like… I know you think that I’m a romantic sycophant” the exact words that Nesta had used to describe both of her sisters before regarding Tamlin and Greysen “but it’s just so breathtaking how the photographer obviously sees you, the light is hitting right off of your eyes and I can see the strain in your muscles and it’s so… you look like a dance warrior” she laughs a little “I know I sound stupid, but the way that he so obviously sees you-”

“He’s a photographer, Elain. It’s his job to be in love with all of his subjects and get the best out of them” Nesta raises herself out of bed and flips on the kettle as she talks to her sister.

“So you never called him” her voice is annoyed, and the truth is that a week ago when that envelope showed up in Nesta’s dressing room she had thought about calling Cassian because yeah she appreciated the photo, and maybe she did enjoy certain parts of their dinner, so she thought about it, she really did. In the end, though…

“The show starts in 3 weeks, now is not the time to be getting my head messed up with some womanizer”

“How do you know that he’s a womanizer?”

“Aren’t all men if they’re attractive and rich enough?”

Elain sighs again “you don’t give people a chance, Nesta.”

“In my experience most people don’t deserve it” her voice is harsh and does not invite questions, so Elain does not ask any.

“Good luck with the show Nesta, I’m sure it’s going to be amazing”

“Thanks, I love you”

“Love you too”

Nesta is definitely _not_ thinking about strong hands working their way easily through the knot in her left shoulder as she fills her bathtub for a pre-rehearsal soak. She is not thinking about how even in this tiny apartment she made sure the bathtub was big enough for 2, and she is definitely, definitely not thinking about going for a run in his neighbourhood again before rehearsal. Nesta grits her teeth and growls as she strips off her oversized sleeping shirt and slips into the scalding hot water.

This man is annoying, she hates how she can’t get him to leave her head and now Elain is going on about it as well. It isn’t a good idea, Nesta knows that. Men aren’t a good idea for someone as driven as her, as busy. They all want things that she can’t give them right now, but it would seem that the logical part of her brain has forgotten to communicate that to the annoying sentimental part of her brain. She lets out a loud huff as she slides all the way down into the water, letting it turn her skin an angry red colour, stopping just shy of immersing her entire face.

* * *

Cassian rolls his eyes when he knows that no one is looking, annoyed by the off-rythym gyrating of the two teenagers on the plexi-glass platform in front of him. He’d made the trek all the way to Brooklynn to try and get some good shots of what was supposed to be an edgy new hip-hop duo. Apparently, it is actually just a couple of basically children with some rich uncle trying to set up their ‘show’ in Brooklynn for ‘street cred’, as if anything across a bridge or a few hundred blocks from the Upper East Side is the South Bronx.

Well, this was a massive waste of time. Though, If Cassian had a dollar for every time he’d gotten excited for some experimental new performance that turned out to be rich kids fucking around he could buy Rockefeller Center. Of course, those few really good ones were worth the really awful ones. Still, it’s been over a week since his camera has been able to catch anything even close to worthwhile and it’s setting his teeth on edge.

“You look as pissed about this shit show as I am” a woman beside him says halfheartedly and he nods in agreement. He turns to see an unimpressed looking woman with dark hair and eyes. She’s young, early 20’s if he has to guess, and her unimpressed glare reminds him so much of someone else.

“Yeah, I’m about one bad twerk away from demanding their rich uncle pay for my parking” he scoffs.

“Who drives in New York anymore” her snort of derision and judgmentally set eyebrows are so familiar that Cassian is caught off guard for a minute. Fuck. The one time in the last week that he isn’t thinking about Nesta and now she’s basically standing in front of him… or, her attitude is anyway.

“If one more person asks me that this month, I’ll sell the damn car”

“Emerie” the woman says, sticking out her hand for him to shake, and he does “I figure if I’m going to insult your life choices you may as well know my name.”

He laughs “Cassian. What brought you here?”

“I run a thrift store a few streets over” she says, pointing up the block “I always try to get out and support the community events, but I see now that this is… not that” she scoffs “sorry you won’t get any good photos”

He shrugs “honestly I’m just trying to get my head into a new project, I’ve been too hung up on my last one.”

“hmm” her tone is contemplative “well I can’t take this anymore so I’m going to go grab a coffee before opening the shop up again, if you care to join?”

Cassian looks down at the woman, she’s not exactly beautiful in the perfect, classic sort of way that Nesta is, but her face is smooth and angular, with the kind of interestingly alluring combination of features that he would normally jump out of his skin to photograph. Right now though, all he can think about is how her eyes are harder than Nesta’s. The pure onyx burns dark, but it doesn’t hold the same steely determination, there isn’t that hint of warmth in the flame.

He hates himself for the way that his mind can’t focus on anything except for Nesta. “Thank you, but I better get back into the city before traffic picks up” she just nods and disappears into the crowd. Cassian curses under his breath at his pathetic inability to talk to any woman without comparing them to _her_. He slings his camera back over his shoulder and makes a decision in his head.

She didn’t call after he left the photo with her. Feyre and Rhys are coming into town for the show, he is going to go with them and then after when they all go out for dinner, when she sees her sisters and is in a good mood, he’ll try again. If she rejects him again then he will.. he’ll jump into the Hudson or something. Anything to get her out of his damn mind.

Cassian makes it all the way into the parking garage of his building before he realizes that he just cannot go back up to his studio, so empty of anything inspiring, and the thought of ordering takeout in his apartment again is just depressing, so he turns the car off, slings his camera over his shoulder and decides to just take a walk. Aren’t people always saying that New York is its own inspiration? City of artists and all that.

* * *

Nesta isn’t really sure what to do with the rest of the day when she steps out of the theatre and into the bright sunlight. The lead choreographer and director decided that they needed to work on the first Act for the rest of the day, which means that Nesta and a few other dancers get to go home early. They weren’t wrong of course, Act 1 does need some… fine tuning, but what exactly is she supposed to do now. It’s a hot summer day and Nesta finds herself wandering up a few blocks absentmindedly. Just as she is thinking that it is entirely too hot to keep walking around aimlessly, she stumbles across a coffee shop/ bookstore and smiles.

Nesta orders herself an iced green tea and wanders aimlessly into the stacks of books. She grabs for a few books with shirtless men and girls in barely there Victorian gowns on the cover and stacks them under her arm quickly and neatly. She is reaching for one more cover, just tilting it when she hears a familiar _Click._

The book falls to the ground and her half-finished tea along with it. She dives down quickly to tuck the book under her arm along with the other two, carefully hiding the titles as she does so. The intruder picks up the dropped cup and gives her a sheepish grin “sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you”

“Then maybe you shouldn’t be stalking me” she growls, practically stomping past him.

Cassian shoots up, chasing behind her “listen I wish that I was clever enough to say that I’ve been looking around coffee shops in the general area of the theatre, but this is just the shop closest to my apartment” he says with a shrug “and… you are the one who wandered so close to where I live, not that I’m complaining” his voice is oozing that easy, teasing charm as he leans against a bookshelf.

Nesta whirls around to face him, noting the earnestness in his hazel eyes. He has her trapped, she realizes. She can’t walk out without either setting down or paying for her books, meaning that unless she wants him to see exactly what she’s buying she is just going to have to talk to him.

“Fine, so you aren’t stalking me specifically. Is it a part of your ‘project’ to just walk around the city and point your camera at random people without their permission?”

“Not usually” he says, eyes smouldering with words that he isn’t saying.

“I put the photo up in my dressing room” her voice is quiet, and it isn’t a thank you, but it might be the closest that Nesta has gotten to providing one to someone other than Elain in a long time.

“I’m glad you liked it, I would love to take more” he is careful with the wording, trying not to scare her away. He knows that in so many ways this woman is fear and ice and coldness personified, but all he sees is a frightened deer trying to run from a hunter. He can’t blame her, for seeing him as a hunter, for seeing men in that way. There were men who were hunters, and there were women who they viewed as prey. The fact that someone looked at the woman in front of him as prey speaks not only to the violence, but also the stupidity, that he knows exist in his gender.

“I don’t sign the contracts for the company”

“Nesta, I-”

“Don’t” she stops, taking in a deep breath, really just not prepared to deal with this. Not prepared to deal with his heat an intensity and the way that his eyes just pierce right into her soul “please just.. don’t finish that sentence. Not right now, I… I can’t”

“Why-”

Nesta decides that she doesn’t care about the books and she spins around, moving quickly enough that he doesn’t even see when she drops them all into a pile on the nearest shelf as she makes a beeline for the door.

“Wait, at least let me buy you another tea-” Cassian’s voice drops with each syllable, not wanting to make a scene as he watches the muscles in her upper shoulders tense before she disappears into the New York heat, appearing for a split second like a mirage that may not have even been there in the first place.


	8. VIII: The Show

**Part VIII: The Show**

In the weeks following their fated run in at the bookstore Cassian did not seen Nesta. Her face bathed in afternoon sunlight ran through his mind every day and he wished, for the first time, that he was a painter like feyre. He wished that he could recreate something from his mind and keep it forever exactly how he saw it instead of being bound to the harsh realities and barriers of his camera.

“You hardly appear dressed for the ballet” a teasing voice sounds from his doorstep and Cassian turns, scowling at his brother for only a moment before dropping the ire and moving swiftly to embrace him. They have been apart too long for him to greet Rhys with anger.

“I suppose I didn’t realize the time” he admits “you certainly cut it close.”

“I booked the latest possible flight to still make it on time. I was dreading hearing the words “family brunch” from Feyre’s delectable lips.”

Cassian scoffs “all you did was rush yourself for no reason. Nesta gets to that blasted theatre at 5am on rehearsal days, I can only imagine the time she arrives for a show day”

“And you would know, brother?”

Cassian stiffens a little “only from a helpful security guard who delivered a message once, weeks ago” Cassian is easy and free in so many ways, he thinks himself an open book, but it’s a façade. When you’re free with people in the most terrifying parts of your life, let them see clearly where you have suffered and hurt, they don’t think to look any deeper for the other feelings. When you laugh and joke and offhandedly recite your war trauma no one thinks to believe you could possibly lie about a woman, of all things. He and Nesta aren’t so different when you really stop and think about it, they both like to hold their cards close to the chest, Cassian just bluffs with a smile and she with a scowl.

Rhysand nods, as though he knows, and Cassian shrugs and slips into the nearly empty walk in closet where he’s stashed a pair of black dress pants, light grey button up shirt and- “do I have to wear a jacket?”

“I’ve been informed yes” Rhys sounds as annoyed as Cassian is “Feyre says it’s a terribly formal affair.”

Cassian scowls a little as he slips into the perfectly tailored matching sport coat and emerges, quickly running pomade-covered fingertips though his gently curling hair “I draw the line at a tie” as it stands his chest is bare through a few undone buttons, black ink swirling into view.

Rhys smiles wickedly “I couldn’t agree more” he practically rips the midnight black tie off of his shirt and undoes a button to show off a matching tattoo.

Rhys has rented a tragically impractical sports car with only 2 seats, so Cassian is carefully leading Elain, whom he has just met, to the parking garage. She is sweet, but quiet.

“I don’t understand why we can’t just walk to the theatre” he muses, opening her door.

“That is because you have never worn high heels” Elain says simply, smoothing the skirt of her lilac-coloured gown as Cassian pulls out of the garage “besides, Nesta is going to be so exhausted after the show, you wouldn’t want to make her walk 15 blocks to the restaurant Rhys picked, would you?” Elain raises an eyebrow gently.

Cassian’s hands grip the wheel “I take it Feyre and Rhys were generous enough to fill you in.”

“They didn’t have to. I saw the photo” her voice is knowing “Nesta says that you look at all of your subjects with the same soul-shattering sense of devotion, but I find that hard to believe”

Cassian realizes quickly that he and Nesta have this in common as well- busybody siblings “I definitely don’t look at all of my subjects the way I look at Nesta” he sighs “I’ve never quite met anyone like your sister.”

“Nesta is special” Elain smiles as the valet opens the door for her. She waits for Cassian to pass off his keys and offer her his arm “Feyre did tell me, however, that it was your idea to bring me here for the show, so thank you.”

“You should see it. Her. You should see her on that stage.”

“So should you.”

* * *

When Nesta steps onto the stage she hears nothing but the music and she doesn’t see anyone as what they are in the world outside of this moment. The audience is not there, Tamlin really is a prince, Lucien really is the man who cursed her, and she… in this moment, she is a swan. Her gauzy skirt slides gently along her thigh as she raises her back leg up into a perfect line above her head. A deep breath and then she falls into the music. That is the funny thing about dance, you strive for months to learn the exact choreography, the steps are so precise, but in the end… it’s the music. Her muscles know what to do, what every movement is and she just lets herself fall into it all.

Cassian sits quietly in the audience. He is certainly someone who captures art, he sees the beautiful photo in the movements, but he has never been a _connoisseur_ of the arts, as it were. The entire first act passes, and he feels himself getting annoyed at the cheesy charades to get the opening of the storyline going and the unending view of men in tights. As the second act looms, his attention is captured by Nesta, and he definitely has an appreciation for the things that she can do with her body, but he won’t say that he necessarily… gets ballet?

The third act is the turning point. Maybe it’s the story behind seeing Nesta step onto that stage in the black foil to her perfect white tutu, maybe it’s the familiarity he has with watching her by this point, or maybe it is just that she seems so entirely… herself. The white swan had a pasted on smile and a sweet edge to her movements. The black swan’s eyes are narrowed, her body is raw grace and power as she enters in a never-ending series of spins, leg flying out to increase her momentum every few turns. There is not a person in the room whose hands don’t come together at the finish of that impossible feat, he can’t imagine how anyone even notices the man who comes behind her and executes his own series of spins. Cassian feels Rhys’ eyes on him as he leans forward, elbows on his knees, jaw slightly open as Nesta spins across the stage, slipping herself easily into the other dancer’s arms. Her back bends impossibly far back and he spins her around. Tamlin is nothing more than a prop in Nesta’s arm as he lifts her into jumps and holds her waist through spins.

By the time intermission rolls around Cassian feels like the breath has been knocked out of him. He already knew that he was a gonner over this woman, but-

“Well you certainly seemed… enraptured” Rhys purrs with a suggestive wiggle of his eyebrows.

Cassian growls a little and slides his way through the crowd to splash some damn water on his face.

* * *

Before they can go to dinner Nesta is expected to show her face at the small sponsors reception in the private booths at the top of the theatre. She wipes off the stage makeup and swipes back on a light, easy layer of eyeliner and blush before slipping into the fitted, one-shouldered midnight blue gown that she has hanging on the back of her door and grits her teeth as she replaces pointe shoes with pumps.

Nesta takes a deep breath and bows her head politely at the clapping sea of complimenting millionaires that she walks into. The last thing that Nesta wants to do is talk to any of these people. She is just about to bite the head off of a leering 80-year-old media conglomerate when a familiar but very unexpected man appears at her side as though out of nowhere “do you mind if I steal away my sister-in-law for a moment?” Rhys’ violet eyes let the old man know that he is not actually asking.

“I’m not your sister-in-law yet. What are you doing here?”

“Good evening Nesta, nice to see you as well. You’re welcome for the rescue by the way” Nesta just blinks slowly “I’ve been a donor to the New York Ballet for years, if you must know.”

Her brows raise into her hairline “really?”

“I am a complex man with many hobbies and interests that you do not know about” his gently teasing voice reminds her of someone else “anyway, I’ve been sent to provide the perfect excuse for you to leave this place. The others went ahead to the restaurant so-”

“Others? Plural? Isn’t it just Feyre?”

He smirks “Elain is here-”

“What?” Nesta’s expression is the kind of gleeful shock that he did not think she was capable of “are you serious?”

“As a heart attack. She and my brother both came, but I rented a 2-seater so they left in his car and I said I would collect the swan queen”

Nesta scowls at the nickname “alright just let me do a quick round and I’ll meet you at the door in 10 minutes”

“I’ll let Cassian know-“ Nesta pauses, turning back to look at her _almost_ brother in law, the question written clearly across her face “oh that’s right, you’ve met my brother” he grins and Nesta just grits her teeth, spinning away as quickly as she can, refusing to give him the satisfaction of having shocked her that he so clearly wants.

* * *

“You could’ve warned me” Nesta grumbles upon seeing Cassian at the large, circular table. Rhysand is parking the car and Elain and Feyre are evidently in the washroom, so they are alone.

“And when exactly would I have done that? All of those times that you didn’t call?” his words are bitter but the voice is light and teasing “or maybe I should have ran out onto the street shirtless and barefoot all those mornings you jogged past my studio?” he pauses for a second, letting his words fully sink in as her scowl turns to more of an adorably horrified expression “oh I know, maybe I was supposed to launch into this complicated history between our siblings and exactly all the ways I put the pieces together during those 30 seconds that you yelled at me in the bookstore to try and hide the fact that you were buying a whole stack of romance novels?”

Nesta takes a deep breath in, lips pursing hard, and Cassian would give almost anything to hear what she was about to say, but of course, Rhys chooses that exact moment to come in from parking the car.

“Thank you for bringing Elain” Nesta says quietly and Rhysand’s eyes go wide, it’s perhaps the first kind thing she has ever said to him. Unfortunately, he can’t take credit for it.

“Don’t look at me, that idea was all Cass” he pauses as the waitress approaches the table balancing two trays, letting Nesta process her shock for a second “the very expensive bottles of champagne, however, were all me”

Just as another server steps up with 2 tall ice buckets, Elain and Feyre return from the bathroom and slide into their seats “looks like we’re just in time” Feyre smiles.

The two servers are standing one on each side of the table, each with a bottle in hand. Rhys nods his head and both bottles _pop_ at the same time. Glasses are filled, bottles put on ice, and surprisingly Elain is the one who steals the moment to speak, just as everyone knows Nesta would want it.

“Nesta has been an extraordinary dancer since before I was born. I remember going to all of your shows as a little girl and thinking that my big sister was a princess. Back then I saw of the beautiful costumes and pretty music. Tonight, I saw you. I saw what you can do, Nesta and it is incredible. Tonight, you were truly the Swan _Queen_ ”

Nesta looks down, blushing a little. Feyre is beaming, her hand resting lightly on top of Rhysand’s. Cassian’s eyes are entirely focused on Nesta and no one moves until Nesta joins Elain in raising her glass “thank you, ‘Lain” her smile is reserved, warm in a completely un-Nesta like way “thank you everyone, for coming” no one could miss the way that her eyes land on Cassian and narrowed just a little, as if examining something new before Feyre’s glass clinks with her sisters’ and the boys join in on the toast

After dinner Nesta hugs Elain closely “I am so glad you came” she pulls back a little, reaching towards Feyre as well “both of you”

Elain smiles “me too. I feel like we haven’t all been together in ages”

“I know, we should really plan for a family Christmas or something” it’s a strange thing for Nesta to say, but she has missed her sisters. “Unfortunately, I have to be at the theatre pretty early tomorrow, so I should probably grab a taxi and-”

“Don’t be ridiculous Nesta, our star is not taking a cab home alone!” Feyre breaks in with a firm voice “Rhysand and Cass switch cars” Feyre’s voice does not invite question as she turns to her fiancé “you’re going to take Elain and I back since you insisted on that ridiculous 2-seater and Cass can take Nesta home”

“But why-” Rhys’ brows crease

“No questions” Elain breaks in as they both stare the boys down and Nesta rolls her eyes, realizing why Feyre and Elain were in the bathroom for so long.

“Seriously, you guys are going to the same building, and I’m all the way in Carnegie Hill . I’ll just grab a-”

“Nope” it is Elain this time.

“I’m happy to do it” Cassian says in that deep, Ernest way that he has and all of a sudden Nesta can’t think of a reason to say no. So she just nods her head and lets her sisters have the joy of getting away with their little plan.

Rhys is clearly grumbling as the 3 say their goodbyes to the 2 and walk in the opposite direction “shall we?” Cassian asks with an uncharacteristically bashful look and an offered arm.

Nesta purses her lips a little, and she isn’t sure if it’s the champagne or the culmination of so many things coming together in this night, or maybe the fact that he brought _Elain_ here, but she accepts his arm and lets him lead her gently to the almost humorously cliché shiny red sports car, and she doesn’t even roll her eyes when he opens the door for her.

Cassian lets his hand drift carefully to her lower back before she can get into the car “I get it now” he murmurs gently “the white and black, the differences, why you _had_ to be both for this dream to really be what you imagined it” he lets out a hard breath “you are _incredible_ , Nesta. Truly, incredible.”

Nesta looks down, unsure exactly where to look or how to respond. She takes a moment to breathe it in and steps just a little bit closer to him “thank you, for Elain” her eyes meet his again and there is an entire world being built in the inches between their gaze. Cassian moves his head forward to lean against hers, their noses just touching and mouths parted ever so slightly. Either one of them could lean forward just a half of an inch and end these weeks of tension and longing. Nesta is the one who moves forward, bottom lip just barely brushing the top of his as she slides into the passenger seat of the car.


	9. Part IX: The Acceptance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go, second to last chapter. I've changed the rating because of this chapter specifically, so be warned this is NSFW (and basically just NSFW, so if you aren't into that then hang on until next chapter, the grande finale!)

**Part IX: The Acceptance**

“You are not as subtle and clever as you think you are” Nesta says to her sisters the following evening, after another show. Elain is leaving in the morning, so she agreed to come over for a few drinks after the performance.

“Subtlety was not the goal” Feyre shrugs.

“No, sticking me in Cassian’s upper east side mom car was, apparently”

Nesta chokes on her wine a little, not about to tell Rhysand that she told Cassian the exact same thing about his car.

“I do have to head home soon, but I am glad I got to see you both again” she smiles a little and Elain hugs her very tightly.

“I am so happy I could see you dance.”

“We should do Christmas in the city next year” Feyre says “all of us, there is nothing like Christmas in New York!” she turns to Rhysand “maybe we could even pull Azriel away from work for a week, he has a damn apartment here that he never uses.”

Rhys smiles his acquiescence to his beautiful fiancé who gives him a slightly mischievous look that lets him know she has some sort of idea or plan forming in her mind and the sisters nod as well “this show runs into the rehearsal time for the Christmas show so I won’t be in that this year, which is rare so the timing couldn’t be better”

Feyre hugs both of her sisters. Nesta raises from the chair she is sitting in gracefully, grabbing her purse from the chair and slips out the door with a quiet smile.

Nesta lied. The show went perfectly tonight, and the director told everyone that they don’t have to be at the theatre until early afternoon tomorrow. She didn’t have to leave yet, and she doesn’t. When she gets inside of the elevator she reaches out, but does not hit the lit up ‘G’, her fingers press gently against the ‘24’.

When Nesta steps out of the elevator to the familiar view, she turns her head to the left and then right, feeling something pulling her to the right. She likes to picture him in the studio at all hours, it just makes sense. When she raises her hand to knock and the door swings open, she is proved correct.

Nesta can feel her breath catch just a little bit at the sight of him bare-chested and bare foot in nothing but a pair of light grey track pants. Cassian opens his mouth to speak, but Nesta cuts him off “if we are going to have this conversation, I will need you to put a shirt on”

He raises his eyebrow a little at that “do you like what you see?”

“Shirt, now. Or I’m leaving” Cassian holds up his hands in surrender and steps into the hallway “where are you-”

“my clothes are in there” he points to the other end of the hallways where she knows he keeps his living space and she follows him quietly “can I get you anything?” his voice is a little apprehensive as she takes in the calming dark blues and whites of his apartment.

“I think we could both use a drink for this”

“Make yourself at home” he gestures to the living room couch and chairs, disappearing for a moment and returning with a bottle of wine and a black T-shirt that was clearly slipped on quickly, still revealing a few inches of chiseled abdominal muscle on one side where it clings to the inside of itself. He grabs 2 glasses and smiles a little at the sight of Nesta so comfortably settled into his couch. He sits himself a respectable few inches away from her and passes her a full glass.

Nesta holds the glass in both of her hands, looking down into the dark red abyss “I meant it when I said that I don’t really do the whole romantic thing. I’m cold and focused and ambitious and I know what I want” she pauses “I’ve never been willing to compromise that”

“I would never ask you to” his voice is low as he tries to get her to raise her eyes to his, to say these things to him instead of her glass of merlot.

“I’m beginning to see that” she admits quietly “I guess it’s the listening that showed me” her voice is still quiet and incredibly steady “I’ve never had someone care to learn about the show I’m doing or how much it would mean to have my sister here or… notice little things the way that you seem to”

“I notice everything about you”

Nesta sighs, finally looking up “and that right there is what my problem is” there is confusion in his eyes as they meet hers “you say these things as if they are facts, these grand statements and declarations, you say that you know you want me or that you see everything and aren’t scared away, but that is not realistic” she takes a sip of her wine “there are things in life that a confident attitude and pretty words won’t accomplish, no matter how earnest. I am… difficult” he laughs a little at that “I know that I am, and you can think that you like this whole spitfire thing right now, but-”

“Nesta I don’t like the ‘spitfire thing’” he says point blank “this isn’t some alpha male excited by the chase phenomenon. I like the way that your mind works, the way that you talk about the things you love, and yes- even the way that you berate me, but not because it’s some turn on- which, to be clear, it is. I like it because you challenge me, make me think and work but also because you are so passionate about the things you care about. You aren’t difficult, you are determined. Difficult is when someone yells for no reason or throws fits. You defend the things you care about, and I respect that.”

Nesta swallows hard “why did you bother? Weeks ago, when I was just a bitchy woman on a stage yelling at you, why did you bother?”

“You have never been ‘just’ anything” the words leave him in a soft breath “the second you fell off of that blood-soaked slipper and turned to those girls behind you… I recognized the fight in your eyes, the power. You were like a commander on a battlefield. The grace and precision…” She bites her lip, beginning to understand “why did you agree?”

“I wanted the photo” she smirks.

“If we’re going to do this-”

Nesta sighs “it was your openness. How unguarded you are despite the things you’ve been through. I’m constantly shielded, so it intrigued me that you could be so open.”

Cassian takes her wine glass from her and sets it on the coffee table, moving closer to brush a strand of hair behind her ear. He leaves his hand where it falls on the side of her face “life is too short to hide what we want” he murmurs “I want you, Nesta Archeron” he leans a little closer, not quite closing the distance between them “I need you.”

His words are a whisper against her lips. There is something carnal and physical deep inside of Nesta’s body that moves her towards him, she locks her lips onto his, grips her hands into his hair and presses her body closer.

"I shouldn't be rewarding you for such cheesy words" she smirks a little against his lips.

Cassian groans, leaning into her as her lips light his on fire. He pulls away for a moment, kissing his way down her jawline, whispering every thought he’s had about her into the crevices of her skin. His lips meet her neck and Nesta throws her head back, gasping a little as he licks and sucks at her sensitive flesh. He croons against her neck, telling her how he’s wanted to fit his mouth to this spot from the second his camera caught is, how he has imagined devouring her body in the same way his camera did, laying her bare and open before him-

“so do it” she nods him on and he pulls back a little.

“Nesta-”

“Show me how your camera saw my body that day on stage, Cassian” a growl rips its way out of his throat at the sound of his name on her lips in such a careful whisper. He presses her back onto the couch, wanting nothing more than to rip that tragically thin dress off of her body.

“Not here, not like this” Cassian musters every ounce of self control inside of him to try and keep things proper, respectful.

“you have a bedroom, I assume?”

What is this woman trying to do to him. “Don’t say things that you aren’t prepared to follow through on, sweetheart”

Nesta stands up, pulling the simple summer dress that she wears over her head so that she stands before him in nothing but ice blue undergarments. Matching armour that bring this soldier to his knees in front of her. Cassian runs his strong, calloused hand down the length of her toned waist, pulling her deftly but gently towards him. His mouth meets the skin of her thighs and the way those muscles rippled as she pulled herself onto pointe in front of his camera flashes through him mind. He takes a sharp inhale and bites down on her lace panties, dragging them down until she can step out of them. Nesta’s own hands remove her bra and it takes everything in Cassian not to stand and take her into his arms. Not now though, now he is a slave on his knees in front of a Queen, and he has a job to do.

He smiles wryly up at her and Nesta cannot remember a second in her life that she has felt so much like a woman. Cassian's hands grip her thighs, thumbs dangerously close to the most private part of her and fingers splayed across her ass. He groans a little as he leans in closer, tongue gently flicking across the sensitive bundle of nerves just inside of her.

Her fingers curl into his hair and she moans as he continues, one careful, thick finger finding her entrance as his mouth continues its gentle study of everything that is _her_. She pulls his hair a little, instinctively, and she can feel him grin wickedly against her sex, moving his tongue faster and harder against that exact spot where he knows she is about to-

“no, not yet, Cassian we have to-” but it’s too late. The sound that Nesta makes is breathless and shocked as much as it is pleasured. The things that course through her body at the feeling of his fingers pressing up at just the right angle while that wicked tongue that she had cursed so many times in the past flicks just hard enough to unravel her.

Cassian looks up at that exact moment, watching her face as he sends her over the edge. Nesta falls to her knees in front of him as well, two helpless fools enslaved to each other. Her arms wrap around his neck and her mouth meets his in a rash of heat and passion. She doesn’t even know what she is saying as she speaks quietly between their kisses “I, I’ve never. That was, I mean-”

Cassian pulls back “Nesta” he is careful about how he speaks “have you ever been with a man?”

Nesta bites her lip and shakes her head side to side slowly “I’ve never felt anything like that”

He smiles, carefully placing both hands on either side of her face “I’m honoured to have been your first”

Cassian stands, still fully clothed and Nesta looks up at him with blazing eyes “if you think we are done, then you are dumber than you look.”

He laughs “maybe we shouldn’t push it too-”

Nesta has the bottom of his shirt fisted in her hands in an instant, she is pushing him against the nearest wall as she tears it over his head, kissing him as she does “where is your bedroom?”

“Nesta-” there is a part of him that is afraid, he doesn’t want to move too quickly, to scare her away.

“Where” she growls again, this time against his throat, and mother help him he is only a man. Cassian lifts her easily into his arms and Nesta wraps her bare legs arounds him. Gods how he has dreamed of this moment. He crashes them into the door of his bedroom, lips joined, and limbs intertwined. It is Nesta’s hand that reaches to open the door. Cassian nearly loses his balance as they tumble into the room.

When Cassian sets Nesta naked and writhing onto the midnight blue silk sheets of his bed it is everything he can do to stop from finishing right then and there. He sheds his pants quickly, placing a leg on either side of her hips.

Nesta brings herself to a careful sitting position, running a delicate hand down every perfectly formed muscle in his chest before following the path to its natural conclusion, looping her thumbs under the soft fabric of his boxer-briefs and pulling them down. She licks her lips a little at the full, hard length of him. She runs her soft hand gently down his cock and Cassian groans “if you keep this up, I won’t last very long” his breath is hot and voice needy against her skin.

Nesta lays herself back, head just fitting against his pillow “I believe in you, soldier” she smirks at him and Cassian leans forward, lining himself up at her entrance as her looks in her eyes.

He skims a gentle hand up her waist, stopping to cup a perfectly round breast as he breathes slowly “we don’t have to do this, if you’re not ready”

Nesta lifts her hips ever so slightly, urging him on “I’m ready” she breathes and it is all the permission that Cassian needs as he slowly lowers himself into her.

Nesta takes a sharp breath in, adjusting to the feel of him. It is like being thrown into a cold river on a hot summer morning. There is shock, a second of pain and then- bliss. Pure, clear, unadulterated bliss like she has never known before.

There are tears pricking at the sides of her eyes as she pants into his mouth, moving her hips in a perfect rhythm with his. A dance of their own making, choreographed in the stars and brought to her like some sort of heaven on earth.

“Am I hurting you?” Cassian asks gently, stopping for a moment at the hint of saltwater that streams down her cheek.

Nesta shakes her head, lifting her hips to meet his in a harder, more needy expression as she bites her lip and cries out “Cassian” reinvigorated by her actions Cassian moves inside of her more quickly, more certain. He moans deeply as she comes undone beneath him for the second time and follows so closely behind her that they may as well be one body.

Cassian is still inside of her when Nesta starts crying “did I-”

“No” she breathes “no that was, I-” she pauses, letting the feeling wash over her, relishing in this moment of enjoying something that Tomas had made her think was so harsh and violent “you are everything that I have been told my entire life was asking for too much”

She breathes the words against his chest as Cassian moves behind her, wrapping her entirely in his strong arms. He will not let her see it, but as he fits himself behind her, holding her, refusing to let the world that has been so harsh to her, to them into this moment, Cassian begins to cry softly as well.


	10. Part X: The Future

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is my little epilogue to wrap the story up, it's short but I hope you all enjoy my way of tying a sugary sweet little bow around these loose ends (because Nessian deserve to be happy in at least one universe dammit!)

**Part X: The Future (epilogue)**

“Rhys says that Az is good to fly out on the 21st, we will probably come on the 20th Elain what is better for you?” Feyre’s voice is chipper for how early it appears to be in… wherever she and Rhysand are now. Nesta can’t keep up with all of the places that his _job_ as an international real estate tycoon (trust-fund baby) takes them.

“I will come on the 21st as well, I’d like to capture those late flower shoppers heading into the weekend on the 20th. I’ll call Azriel to see if we can arrange to share a car from the airport”

Nesta’s eyebrows move up a little but she does not say anything as they plan what has become an annual 'family Christmas' in New York. Can you call something annual if this is only the second time they’ve done it? She thinks yes, at least then they can say that they have a family tradition.

“Alright, the show will close on the 22nd so I’ll get everyone tickets for that night, and we can go out after but that does mean I that I won’t be able to see you when you get in ‘Lain” they both look a little sad. Christmas is still months away, Nesta hasn’t even begun rehearsals for The Nutcracker yet, the cast E mail should be out any minute, but apparently refreshing her inbox and trying to distract herself with holiday plans doesn’t make information come out any faster.

“It also means” Feyre says a little mischievously “that you will have no excuse post show to run off to bed early and we can _really_ have some fun”

Elain laughs and Nesta grimaces a little, not saying out loud that she will probably still manage to find an excuse to turn in early if she has any say in the situation “Oh E mail’s here, gotta go. Love you talk to you later!”

“Love you!” Elain smiles.

“Say hi to Cass for me” Feyre adds quickly as Nesta hits the close icon on her video chat and takes a few deep breaths before clicking ‘open’.

Nesta wants to jump out of her own skin when she sees the cast E mail for the Christmas show. She’s wanted to dance this part for a long time of course, and one can’t always be the lead. No, it isn’t the part that makes her roll her eyes. It’s the shirtless man who walks into the room at that exact moment, track pants hung low on his hips as he enters from his studio across the hall.

Cassian smiles a little at the sight of Nesta curled up on the couch in his T-shirt, long lean legs tucked up underneath her, cup of tea half-finished and forgotten on a marble coaster in front of her, laptop balanced on her thighs. He has never been so happy that he outright bought the second apartment from Azriel- at a steep upcharge from the current market, might he add- the day that Nesta told him how much she loved the view. Once he told her of the purchase, he also said that she had to move in now because he’d bought an apartment for her. It just made sense.

Of course, she had a few choice words about his logic, but in the end, here she is. He also had a full wall of mirrors and a long wooden bar put into the second giant bedroom in the studio, which was already equipped with Bluetooth speakers, and everything just kind of fit perfectly with the two of them, their lives intertwined as if fate had already lined up the threads but forgotten to weave them together until now.

_“You shouldn’t give up any of your studio space” Nesta said with wide eyes when he did it “I don’t want to stop you from getting work done”_

_Cassian had smirked at that “trust me Sweetheart, this is entirely selfish. You know how I love to sneak up on you with my camera while you prance around in those little-”_

_“You are incorrigible” she rolled her eyes, but a smile pulled at the corner of her lips nonetheless._

That was last Christmas, nearly 9 months ago now. The day before Feyre and Rhys’ wedding if he is remembering correctly. Such a clever girl, his sister in law, to plan her simple yet beautifully elegant elopement at a time where she would be in the city she loved, with all of the people that she loved. Plus, it brought Azriel back so that Cassian could buy his apartment out from under him, so win-win. Azriel and Elain getting along so well was really just a bonus.

Nesta shifts a little on the couch and it brings him back to the present. The river outside the window is just starting to show the first signs of frost, and the leaves on the trees are falling in coppers and reds that make him want to throw Nesta in the middle of a pile of them and devour her with his camera. At this exact moment though, he has a different kind of devouring in mind.

He walks up behind her, wrapping his arms around her slim shoulders from the back. He presses a gentle kiss to her temple. He is just about to whisper something throaty and seductive into her ear when he spots what is on her laptop screen and bursts out into a fit of laughter.

“I bet you’re feeling pretty satisfied right about now” she glowers as he leaps over the back of the couch to join her, laying his arm lazily across the back cushion.

“Darling I can only think of about 6 other things involving you and this couch that could possibly have me feeling _more_ satisfied, and none of those involve clothes, so yes… this is pretty high on the list”

Nesta scrunches up her nose in annoyance and he leans forward to place a teasing kiss right on the wrinkles at the bridge before pulling back and looking her directly in the eyes “I love you, _Sugar Plum Fairy_ ”

Nesta glowers half-heartedly “I love you too, brute.”

It’s that pointed glower that has him reaching into his pocket for the little velvet box he’s been carrying around for weeks now. They’d been to nice restaurants and beautiful walks in the city, he’d thought about, booked, and cancelled pretty much every single cliché romantic gesture a man in New York has access too- and that was a lot. He even thought about waiting until Christmas, but that seemed cheesy as hell and he knew she wouldn’t want everyone around.

Looking at her scrunched up nose, narrowed eyes, and lips that she has to press into a straight line to stop the smile from taking over her face, he knows that this is it. Nothing dramatic, just him and her on the couch where they had first come together. The only thought going through Cassian’s mind as he slips down easily and casually on to one knee, molding into the floor as though him on his knees before her is the most natural position in the world, is that he would give anything to see her on this couch in his T-shirt for the rest of their lives.

He says as much when he pops open the box, and It is less than a minute before that glittering diamond ring is the only scrap of clothing on either of their bodies.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who followed along on my first foray into Nessian fanfic. These 2 have really gotten under my skin so I have started another Nessian fic if anyone is interested in checking that out:
> 
> https://archiveofourown.org/works/24012544/chapters/57769021#workskin


End file.
